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THE ALCOTTS 

As I Knew Them 

BY 

CLARA GOWING 

Author of 
POEMS 

"my chest, or ransacking" 



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THE C. M. CLARK PUBLISHING COMPANY 

BOSTON MDCCCCIX 



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Copyright, I 90S 

THE C. M. CLARK PUBLISHING CO 

BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS 
U S. A. 

AM Rights Reserved 



CLA258U; 



Brtrtrateb 

TO MY OLD SCHOOLMATE 

MRS. S. H. LUNT 

AND HER DAUGHTER 

MISS E. H. LUNT 











CONTENTS 











PAGE 

Preface by the Author i 

Introduction by F. B. Sanborn ... ii 

Louisa May Alcott 1 

Mr. Alcott 31 

Mrs. Alcott 80 

Anna 107 

May 122 











ILLUSTRATIONS 











The Author Frontispiece 



Louisa . . . took me for a short drive . 9 
She bounded down the path .... 18 



The boys cheered the flag and 
the maker 



67 



^[pP 



PREFACE 

Having met from time to time, during 
the past years, many of Louisa Alcott's 
admirers who were interested in anything 
that concerned her or her family, I con- 
ceived the idea of glancing backward 
threescore years and giving to the public 
not only some incidents of her girlhood, 
but also a little sketch of other members 
of the family. 

In writing of Mr. and Mrs. Alcott I 
have been indebted to the kindness of 
Mr. F. B. Sanborn for facts in their early 
life. He generously gave me permission 
to "quote all you wish, only give credit 
to the 'Memoir of Bronson Alcott/' ' and 
this I have done. 

The writing of this little book has been 
to me a labor of love, recalling as it has 
so many happy days spent with my 
friends "The Alcotts." That it may 
give the readers pleasure is the wish of 
The Author, 

Clara Gowing. 



INTRODUCTION 

Although Louisa Alcott was of nearly 
the same age with me (not quite a year 
younger), I did not see her until I was 
in college, and she a young woman of 
nearly twenty. For her earlier life, then, 
I have had to depend on her own state- 
ments and those of her family, besides 
the facts recorded by my friend, Mrs. 
Cheney (who introduced me to the family 
in 1852), in her authorized biography of 
Miss Alcott. It always seemed to me 
that Mrs. Cheney dwelt rather too much 
on the somber side of Louisa's life; and 
it is also true that Louisa herself, in her 
later years of invalidism, viewed some- 
what too regretfully the burdens and 
misfortunes of the family, whose romantic 
experiences furnished many of the inci- 
dents of her lively and pathetic tales. 
ii 



Introduction 

I therefore welcome any facts or writ- 
ings that present this woman of warm 
fancy and generous heart as she was in 
her happy childhood; for neither her 
childhood nor her youth could be very 
unhappy, with her cheerful, practical 
and social temper, touched, as it surely 
was, with an occasional tinge of melan- 
choly, growing out of the accidents of 
life, or the development of a rich nature. 
Such are the artless recollections of Miss 
Gowing, a Concord playmate of Louisa's 
after the family returned from the Fruit- 
lands experiment to the rural life of 
Concord. These were the years from 
1845 onward, when the exuberance of 
her spirits got the better of whatever 
was depressing in the family fortunes. 
The four sisters were all together, in 
good health, of ages ranging from five 
to fourteen in 1845, and with such varie- 
ties of talent and character as adapted 
them to form a happy quartette and to 
draw about them a variety of character 
iii 



Introduction 

in their childish associates. Although 
misunderstood and unappreciated by the 
general society of the small village, the 
family had warm and admiring friends 
in the Emersons, the Thoreaus, Chan- 
nings and Hawthornes, of literary fame, 
and the children mingled on equal terms 
with those of other families to whom 
the opinions and habits of the Alcotts 
were puzzles. 

Fortunately, children do not much 
care for the standards by which their 
elders judge of their own contemporaries. 
They have standards of their own,, and 
their intimacies are likely to conform to 
those, whatever may be the verdict of 
others. Clara Gowing, therefore, with 
little interest in the problems which the 
learned seniors were trying to work out, 
found herself much interested in Louisa 
Alcott and her sisters, and in these 
pages she records what then concerned 
these playmates. How much she saw, 
or would have understood had she seen, 
iv 



Introduction 

of the public and social experiments 
going on in the Transcendental Period, 
then in its bloom, I cannot say. But 
this side of Concord life has been fully 
treated by others, and she only under- 
takes the simpler task of reporting what 
went on from day to day in the children's 
world — often as little understood, even 
by aunts and cousins, as the child com- 
prehends what is passing in the elder 
world, so near and yet so far away. I 
consider this proper to be done, because 
the interest of successive cycles of girls 
in the Alcott view of life, as presented by 
Louisa, requires that all the incidents, 
typical or trivial, which made Louisa 
what she has been to them, should be 
simply narrated, as is done in these pages, 
so far as they have come under my notice. 

F. B. Sanborn. 

Concord, Mass. 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 



Louisa May Alcott 

In the spring of 1845 the usually 
tranquil neighborhood in Concord, Massa- 
chusetts, known as the "East Quarter," 
was somewhat agitated by learning that 
Mr. A. Bronson Alcott had purchased a 
place in that part of the town, which he 
would occupy with his family. 

Previous to this he had been a citizen 
of the town long enough to acquire the 
reputation of being a fanatic in belief 
and habit, and he had recently come 
from a community of Transcendentalists 
in Harvard, Massachusetts. (What the 
term Transcendentalist really meant was 
not generally understood, but it was sup- 
posed to be something entirely unortho- 
dox.) He attended no church, had been 
1 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

arrested for not paying his taxes because 
he would not support a government so 
false to the law of love as that which was 
advocated in the Boston papers, es- 
chewed all animal food, and had attempt- 
ed to do without everything the use of 
which cost the life of the creature, such 
as leather for boots and shoes, and oil 
for burning; and he carried his anti- 
slavery principles so far as to give up 
sugar and molasses made at the South, 
also cotton, or anything produced by 
slave labor. In a family of restricted 
means it was found rather impracticable 
to carry out all these ideas, and when 
they came to the "East Quarter" they 
used oil for light, cotton goods and sugar, 
and yielding to the wife's and children's 
requirement, milk. 

The place he purchased, about a mile 
from the village, consisted of several 
acres of land and a two -story house 
standing quite near the main road, with 
the front door in the middle, on which 
2 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

was an old-fashioned knocker. A wheel- 
wright's shop was on one side of the 
house, and a barn on the opposite side 
of the road, with a high hill covered with 
trees for a background. Over this hill 
a part of the British troops marched 
when they entered and left Concord on 
the memorable 19th of April, 1775, the 
hill being on the north side of the road 
from Lexington to Concord and extend- 
ing for a mile, ending just beyond the 
old church. 

To use Mrs. Alcott's own words, "we 
moved the barn across the road, cut the 
shop in two and put a half on each end 
of the house." On each L so formed 
was a piazza with a door opening into 
the front room as well as one into the L. 
There were no less than eight outside 
doors to the house. Mrs. Alcott used 
to say, when a rap was heard, each one 
started for one of the doors. In the west 
L each of the two older girls, Anna and 
Louisa, had a little room for a studio 
3 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

all her own, in which she reigned su- 
preme. Louisa loved to be alone when 
reading or writing, and a door from her 
room opening toward the hill gave her 
opportunity to slip out into the woods 
at her pleasure. 

On the opposite side of the road their 
land extended to a brook where Mr. 
Alcott built a rustic bathhouse with a 
thatched roof, which they used daily 
in warm weather; the girls scampering 
across the road and field, plunging into 
the brook and back again as quickly as 
possible. In winter time a shower bath 
in the house was used instead, for bath- 
ing and outdoor exercise were important 
elements to the Alcotts. On the hill 
back of the buildings Mr. Alcott made a 
rustic summer house and laid out walks 
and terraces. With a high picket fence 
and shrubbery in front, the lower rooms 
were quite screened from the passers-by, 
and this gave a feeling of retirement 
which was congenial to them. 
4 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

The family consisted of Mr. and Mrs. 
Alcott and four daughters — Anna Bron- 
son, Louisa May, Elizabeth Sewell and 
Abby May. On account of the peculiar 
views held by Mr. Alcott, in many of 
which his wife felt no sympathy, the 
neighbors were not forward in calling, 
and though all summer and fall I passed 
the house in going to the village to school, 
my acquaintance with the girls did not 
progress much beyond our peeping at 
each other through the fence, and a 
mutual desire for companionship, each 
hesitating to make the advance. But 
the next winter, 1845-46, by dint of 
much teasing, Anna and Louisa per- 
suaded their mother to allow them to 
attend the district public school, some- 
thing they had never done before. As 
the teacher was a young man, John 
Hosmer, who had recently come from 
the Brook Farm Community School and 
was in some degree in sympathy with 
the Alcotts, their desire was more readily 
5 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

granted than it would otherwise have 
been. 

Louisa was thirteen years old, tall and 
slim; in fact, limbs predominated and 
were used freely, so that she was the 
fleetest runner in school, and could walk, 
run and climb like a boy. At one time 
she trundled her hoop from her home to 
the foot of Hardy's Hill, the distance of 
a mile, turned and came back without 
stopping. She had dark brown hair, 
pleasant gray eyes with a peculiar twinkle 
in them, and a sallow complexion. She 
was not prepossessing in personal appear- 
ance, and in character a strange combina- 
tion of kindness and perseverance, shyness 
and daring; a creature loving and spite- 
ful, full of energy and perseverance, full 
of fun, with a keen sense of the ludicrous, 
apt speech and ready wit; a subject of 
moods, than whom no one could be jollier 
and more entertaining when geniality was 
in ascendency, but if the opposite, let her 
best friend beware. 
6 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

That she was not a boy was one of her 
great afflictions; her impulsive disposi- 
tion was fretted by the restraint and 
restrictions which were deemed essential 
to the proper girl. Most of her books 
have some one character in which her 
own traits are more or less conspicuous. 
In "Hospital Sketches" and " Little 
Women" they are very prominent; the 
latter, in fact, as is well known, is a 
family book, the traits of character, 
except those of Mr. Alcott, being true 
to life, and many, though not all of the 
incidents. The opening chapter of " Hos- 
pital Sketches" is a good sample of 
family conversation, and as the following 
chapters were letters written home, they 
are really part and parcel of herself, and 
through them one sees Louisa in maturity 
in her true self, impulsive, warm-hearted, 
self-reliant, earnest to do good, self- 
sacrificing, gentle and tender to the 
suffering, indignant at wrong, cheerful 
under difficulties, sympathetic and grate- 
7 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

ful for kindness, with a quick sense of 
the comical under all circumstances. 

In regard to the studies of the sisters 
that winter (for one sister cannot be con- 
sidered without the other, so closely 
united were the two) I have only faint 
recollection, but I am inclined to think 
they did not join classes in general. 
Mr. Alcott did not believe in the use of 
text-books and the usual method of im- 
parting knowledge, and he had taught 
them at home by his own method, that 
of conversation. Grammar they never 
studied from books. Of the jolly good 
times during that winter, both at school 
and at their home, and in the years that 
followed, I have most pleasant remem- 
brance. It was a new life to the sisters, 
who for the first time associated with 
those of their own age in a promiscuous 
school, and the friendship then formed 
between Anna and myself, though inter- 
rupted by seasons of separation, was 
never broken. 

8 




Louisa took me for a short drive. 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

Louisa, though younger than Anna, 
was the controlling spirit, and often 
shocked her sensitive sister by some 
daring speech or deed. Thus, one morn- 
ing on their way to school, seeing the 
horse and sleigh of a neighbor at a house 
they were passing, Louisa, much to the 
chagrin of her sister, took possession of 
it and, coming along as I was starting 
for school, took me for a short drive, 
then returned the team to the place 
where she found it. Years after, when 
the white mingled with the brown on 
our heads, reference was made, in our 
reminiscences, to this schoolgirl episode; 
she laughing, said, "and Bart kissed me 
when I got out." (Promiscuous kissing 
was under a ban in their family.) 

The three months of school being over, 
we could not of course be together every 
day, and the plan of having a postoffice 
was originated; so on the hillside about 
midway between our homes, a hollow 
stump was cleared out and a box duly 
9 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

installed to receive our missives, and 
much sentiment and much fun passed 
through this repository. It was visited 
daily or oftener, and cruelly abused did 
we feel if on going there we did not find 
something for ourselves. Each had a 
fictitious signature. In looking over 
these little notes, which have been care- 
fully treasured for more than half a cen- 
tury, I do not find one commencing in 
the usual schoolgirl style of that time, 
" I now take my pen in hand " nor ending 
with "My pen is poor, my ink is pale," 
etc. I do not think they ever used such 
a form; formality in all respects was 
distasteful to them; but Louisa now and 
then sent a rhyme. The following ac- 
companied a bouquet: 

" Clara, my dear, your birthday is here 
Before I had time to prepare, 
Yet take these flowers, fresh from Nature's 
bower, 
All bright and fair." 

In winter evenings whist was a favorite 
10 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

diversion, Mrs. Alcott thinking a game 
of cards much more enjoyable and less 
harmful than the kissing games usually 
resorted to among the young. When a 
little party was invited for the girls, she 
was always present to suggest and assist 
in the games, selecting those in which 
this feature was not admissible. At one 
time a boy in some game ventured to kiss 
Anna, much to the indignation of all, and 
Louisa especially stormed about it. He 
was ever after known in the family as 
"Mr. Smack." They were in the habit 
among themselves of using nicknames 
for some of their mates, chosen for some 
incident connected with the person ; thus, 
a boy at school who would one day wear 
a pair of mittens, leave one or both on the 
window seat, and come the next day with 
another pair, or odd ones, as the case 
might be, was dubbed "Mr. Mitten." 
Louisa was very fond of whist and was 
the life of the party, yet, if she was deeply 
interested in a book when her presence 
11 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

was desired, no persuasion could lure her 
from her den till she chose to come, — 
then all was sunshine. 

After the winter at school, the girls 
studied at home, reading French and 
German, and reciting to George Brad- 
ford or Henry Thoreau. They spent 
much time together over their books, 
one often reading aloud while the others 
sewed, and Mrs. Alcott was one with her 
daughters, entering with sympathetic 
heartiness into all that concerned them, 
and telling stories of her family and past 
life, many of which Louisa wove into 
her writings to give them the charm of 
naturalness. If there were any school- 
girl secrets, it was only for a time, to end 
in a happy surprise. 

They were very fond of fairy tales in 
those days, and writing them was one of 
Louisa's first attempts at composition. 
Their library contained all Miss Edge- 
worth's novels, Scott's, Miss Bremer's 
and Dickens' works, and other standard 
12 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

books of the day. Dickens was a great 
favorite; they never tired of his comic 
scenes and characters from real life, and 
frequent peals of laughter were always 
heard when "Boz" was the entertainer. 
Having a good memory, Louisa stowed 
away the funny parts for future diver- 
sion, recalling them at opportune times 
for her own amusement and that of 
others. 

Birthdays were always noticed by the 
family as well as all holidays; tableaux 
and plays were then brought out, as they 
were in fact at any other time when the 
spirit moved. By enclosing a piazza at 
the end of the house with draperies, they 
improvised a stage very easily, and in 
their attic was a quantity of ancestral 
finery, brocaded silks, satin slippers, old 
laces, shawls, wigs, etc., which did duty 
on these occasions. Louisa usually took 
a comic or tragic part, or that of an old 
woman. If memory failed, she never 
hesitated, but extemporized from her 
13 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

own brains and often put the other actors 
to their wits' end by some unexpected 
originality. If an impromptu play was 
desired, the mother and sisters could do 
their part by just knowing the spirit of 
the subject. 

The Alcotts lived and dressed plainly 
at this time, ignoring fashion, and thus 
had much time for outdoor exercise, 
even while doing their own work. Al- 
though they lived a mile from the village, 
the distance was thought nothing of. I 
have known the girls to walk three miles 
after dinner, make a good social call, 
and return to supper. A walk of five or 
six miles was just good exercise for them. 
In later years Louisa walked from Boston 
home one Sunday, a distance of twenty 
miles, having missed the train Saturday 
night, and arrived in Concord about 
1 p. m.; and as there were callers that 
evening, she walked part way to the 
village with them, "for exercise," she 
said. 

14 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

Mrs. Alcott was in the habit of joining 
her children and a few of their mates in 
long walks; and days or half -days were 
spent at Walden Pond, Fairy Land, Fair- 
haven and other quiet resorts in the 
woods. Mr. Alcott sometimes accom- 
panied us and mingled some of his wise 
thoughts with our pleasure. One day at 
Walden he wrote on the sand with a 
stick, much to our amusement, to show 
how he learned to write when a boy. 
The sand and his mother's kitchen floor 
were his copy-book, which he was allowed 
to use just before it was to be washed. 

A favorite resort with us girls near 
our homes, where we could go with 
safety by ourselves, was to a pool which 
F. B. Sanborn in his " Reminiscences 
of Seventy Years" calls "Gowing's 
Swamp"; it was a walk to which he and 
his group did not invite everyone, he 
says, but one clay Channing took Haw- 
thorne there; the latter was not an ob- 
server or lover of nature, and after giving 
15 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

a glance around he desired to "get out 
of this dreadful hole." 

We girls approached the pool by a 
narrow path at the foot of a wooded hill 
which skirted a blueberry swamp and 
led out to a knoll, and there jumping 
across a narrow stream, we were at the 
pool which was bordered by flowering 
shrubs in their season, and in the vicinity 
were to be found the pyrola with its 
exquisite waxen blossom, foxberry, or 
eye-bright whose dainty delicate white 
bloom changed to the bright red berry, 
half hidden among the leaves, sweet-fern, 
Solomon's seal, checkerberry leaves, ferns, 
and in fact all the rich treasures of nature 
found in the wild woods and of which 
we girls plucked abundantly. We named 
the place Paradise, and spent many 
happy hours there. 

At the end of three years, in 1848, the 

family moved to Boston, and Louisa 

taught a few pupils, had the care of little 

children or sewed, and wrote fairy tales 

16 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

and stories for papers and magazines as 
she had time. Writing and enacting 
dramas engaged her leisure hours, for 
she had a natural taste for the stage. 

In 1857 the Alcotts returned to Con- 
cord and purchased, with money left to 
the girls by a relative, the place adjoin- 
ing their old home, which was then 
owned and occupied by Nathaniel Haw- 
thorne. Here Louisa soon found an 
agreeable circle of young people and 
entered into their social functions with 
the energy and zeal which was character- 
istic of her; in fact she soon became a 
leader in their amusements, masquer- 
ades, tableaux, charades, etc., which 
were her special delight. Her mirth and 
good humor made her a favorite every- 
where. 

An amateur artist of Woburn (C. W. 
Reed), accepted an invitation from a 
friend to attend a masquerade in Concord 
and there met Louisa Alcott; again he 
met her at a small social party where 
17 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

the entertainment was chatting, telling 
stones and music. During the evening 
Louisa asked him to sketch their house 
at "The Orchard," or as she sometimes 
called it, "Apple Slump." Accordingly 
next morning he took his stand in the 
field across the road opposite the house 
and with sketch book and pencil began 
his work. Louisa, her sister, May, and 
their friend, Miss Barrett, were sitting 
on the porch under Louisa's den at the 
end of the house. When Louisa spied 
him, she bounded down the path across 
the road and at a hand vault cleared the 
bars of the gateway and entered the 
field where he stood and asked if he 
minded her looking on while he drew. 
"Certainly not," replied Reed. Pres- 
ently she asked where his line of sight- 
was, his point of sight, his vanishing 
points, etc. All of which Reed knew 
nothing about and so informed her. 
"Then how do you draw your lines?" 
she inquired. He replied, "I make my 
18 




She bounded down the path. 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

lines where I see they are." Whereupon 
she called to the girls, " Oh, goody, come 
quick and see an artist who doesn't 
bother about making points of sight, lines 
of sight, or vanishing points." So the 
two girls ran across the road, jumped 
the fence in the same way Reed had done 
when he entered the field, and Louisa, 
also, and all three watched the sketching. 
When finished, Louisa said she would 
like her father to meet Reed and see the 
picture, so they all went to the house. 
After Mr. Reed had been presented to 
Mr. Alcott and the latter had examined 
the sketch, he placed his hand on the 
artist's head and said, " Young man, you 
are a child of light, a child of God." 
Reed replied he thought he did not quite 
understand what Mr. Alcott meant by 
that. Mr. Alcott took him around the 
house, and, pointing to some bright 
flowers, said, "These are God-like; they 
represent all that is good, but the night- 
shade, belladonna and others of like 
19 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

nature are of darkness, of evil." Reed, 
being but a youth, was about to express 
his lack of conception of the idea, when 
Louisa gave him a poke with her toe as 
a hint for him to keep silent and let her 
father ramble on in his own deep far- 
away manner, which he did for a time 
while the young people listened with due 
respect, then Mr. Alcott retired to his 
study and the young people chatted 
after their own manner. Louisa drew a 
hand in the artist's sketch book on the 
page opposite the house; it represented a 
hand, with all but the index finger closed, 
and showed that the pencil was not her 
forte. Then she wanted Reed to draw 
one. He took the book and said, "Hold 
out your hand, please." "Oh, is that 
the way you do it?" she said. The old 
sketch book of more than fifty years ago 
now bears evidence of this little episode 
in Louisa's girlhood. 

When the war broke out, Louisa was 
among the first to go to Washington as 
20 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

nurse in 1862. Her letters written home 
during her stay of about two months 
there were published in the Boston Com- 
monwealth and copied by other papers all 
over the North. On her recovery from 
the fever which had made her stay in 
Washington so brief, these letters, which 
had been revised, were published in book 
form with one or two chapters added, 
under the title of "Hospital Sketches." 
As every one at that time was deeply in- 
terested in anything that pertained to 
the soldiers, the book made a stir and 
sold rapidly. 

Thus encouraged, she took to her pen 
again, writing stories for papers and 
magazines, and after a while ventured to 
have "Moods" published. In her "Life, 
Letters and Journals," edited by Mrs. 
Ednah D. Cheney, is a graphic description 
of her trials and discouragements in 
getting this, her first novel, before the 
public. It was severely criticised by 
some on account of its views of marriage, 
21 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

yet when republished after fame had 
been acquired from " Little Women," 
the same persons said " it was not so bad, 
after all." 

In 1865 she accompanied an invalid 
lady to Europe, and during her travels 
she met a Polish youth from whom she 
conceived the character of Laurie in 
" Little Women." More than one young 
man on this side of the water has claimed 
the distinction, but the Pole in Vevey 
was the real original. Two years later, 
in 1867, "Little Women" was written. 
Its lifelike incidents made it very attrac- 
tive to both young and old; the children 
were wild over it, and like Oliver Twist, 
" asked for more." The financial success 
of the book made the family independent, 
and "An Old-Fashioned Girl" followed. 

Another trip was taken to Europe, the 
incidents of which are given in "Shawl 
Straps" in her own amusing style; but, 
on account of nerves shattered by over- 
work, she did not find the enjoyment or 
22 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

improvement she had expected. One 
reason may have been that she continued 
to use the pen, for while she was in Rome 
news was received of the death of her 
sister Anna's husband, and she imme- 
diately wrote "Little Men," the pro- 
ceeds of which were devoted to the 
education of the two little boys left 
fatherless. 

At one time Scribner wanted her to 
write a serial for his magazine, and she 
declined on account of her mother, who 
was not well, while her own health was 
also not good. He asked her to set her 
price; she replied " three thousand dol- 
lars," thinking he would not give it, but 
he told her to go on, and "Under the 
Lilacs" was produced. Other books of 
hers are "Work," "Eight Cousins," 
"Rose in Bloom," "Jack and Jill," "A 
Garland for Girls," "My Boys," "Trans- 
cendental Wild Oats," "A Modern Me- 
phistopheles," etc., etc. One of her last 
books was "Lu Lu's Library," a series of 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

short stories written for her little niece, 
the daughter of her artist sister. 

In the autumn of 1877 Mrs. Alcott, 
after much suffering, passed away. 
Louisa had been able to be with her 
during most of her sickness and wrote 
while caring for her. Her death was a 
severe blow to Louisa, as the tie between 
them was most tender and sweet. Their 
dispositions were much alike. Her sister 
May, who was in Paris at this time, was 
married the next spring, and the acquisi- 
tion of a brother, together with May's 
happiness, served to distract attention 
from her grief, but the memory of her 
dear mother was held sacred through life. 

She looked forward to a visit to May, 
in the near future, her health not per- 
mitting it then, but two years later the 
dear petted sister May followed the 
mother. Anna writes of Louisa at that 
time: "I have never seen her brave 
heart so broken; so many hopes are 
shattered, and so much to which she has 
24 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

looked forward so long has now vanished 
forever." Her little namesake, the child 
of May, became Louisa's, the last bequest 
of the mother. Of her coming to them, 
Anna wrote, "a healthy, happy little 
soul, she comes like sunshine to our sad 
hearts, and takes us all captive by her 
winning ways and lovely traits." 

To this child Louisa devoted her time 
and love until, broken in health, she was 
obliged to leave her home and cares for 
a quiet place to rest and recuperate. 
But she had ventured too much in writing 
so incessantly in the past. Her nervous 
system never rallied from the strain and 
for several years she was an invalid. 
Though not able to write, her brain still 
thought stories for the children. 

The last fifteen months of her life she 
made her home with Dr. Lawrence of 
Roxbury, who attended her wherever 
she went for a change. A day or two 
before her father passed away, she drove 
to Boston to see him, and as she stood 
25 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

by his bedside, just before leaving, she 
said, "As you lie here, father, what do 
you think about ?" Pointing his finger 
upward, he said, "I think of the loved 
ones up there, and I am going to them 
soon." Louisa replied, "I wish I was 
going, too." And her wish was gratified; 
the next day she was taken very ill with 
meningitis and on the 6th of March, 
1888, just two days after her father left 
this life, she followed, not knowing he 
had gone before. The last service of 
love which friends give to the departed 
was paid to her in the same rooms at 
Louisburg Square so recently left by her 
father. Her poem, "In Memoriam," to 
her mother, and a poem from her father 
to herself formed part of the sacred 
tribute friends rendered to her life; and 
the body which had been the dwelling 
place for the soul of Louisa May Alcott 
for fifty-six years was taken to Sleepy 
Hollow Cemetery in Concord and buried 
with her parents and her sister Elizabeth. 
26 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

Louisa had a fine figure and a well- 
formed head, covered with an abundance 
of brown hair, which she wore in a simple, 
becoming style, rather than follow the 
fashion, if not pleasing to her taste. An 
easy dignity of bearing, a face beaming 
with intelligence and good nature, and 
a twinkling of the gray eye when some- 
thing pleased her, made her an attractive 
woman, if not what would be called 
handsome . An hour spent with her when 
she was feeling well, in listening to some 
recital of her experience, either pathetic 
or humorous, was like a refreshing cordial 
to the spirits. 

Knowing from her own experience the 
benefit of a little help to a struggling 
aspirant, she delighted, in her quiet way, 
in assisting young persons who were thus 
striving. 

While appreciating with pleasure the 
honest interest and respect which her 
talent duly received from those she es- 
teemed, she instinctively shrank from 
27 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

the rude and obtrusive curiosity of the 
mere sight-seers. She once said to some 
young boys, "Whatever you do, don't 
do anything to get fame." The many 
callers which the School of Philosophy 
brought to Concord, and their curiosity, 
which drew them to the home of the 
Alcotts, were truly distasteful to her, and 
when circumstances favored, she avoided 
them. 

She advocated " woman suffrage," and 
when the opportunity to vote for school 
committee was given to the women, she 
was the first to register in Concord, and 
she endeavored to interest the women of 
the town to do so. She was much tried 
by their apathy on the subject, but was 
herself one of the twenty to vote. 

She enjoyed writing and felt she had a 
special gift for that, which no one will 
deny, but she was also ever ready to 
adapt herself to the circumstances of her 
checkered life. Often in the midst of 
writing a book she would need to leave 
28 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

it for days or months, while she attended 
to the work of the family, cheerfully 
doing the cooking, washing dishes, clean- 
ing house, nursing, or sweeping, as the 
case required, for she could turn her hand 
to anything. At one time she wished 
for a hat to match a new dress, and failing 
to find one to her mind in Boston, she 
bought a white straw and painted it to 
suit her taste ; and that was after money 
was plenty. The desire to write one 
book at leisure and uninterrupted was 
never gratified, for when leisure came, ill 
health prevented her writing more than 
an hour or two at a time, and at last it 
was only half an hour. 

Going West with her father in the fall 
of 1875, she began to realize how famed 
she was. At Oberlin College the young 
ladies wished to hear her speak; but as 
public speaking was not in her line, 
though she was delightful in conversation, 
she said she would stand and turn round, 
so all could see her, and so she did turn 
29 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

round three times. On the return she 
stopped in New York City, intending to 
remain there the rest of the winter, but 
a sudden return home disclosed a singular 
fact. Finding herself greatly lionized and 
having worn her one party dress, a black 
silk, till "Mrs. Grundy" demanded a 
new one, she thought best to fly to the 
home nest before she was led into ex- 
travagance and become vain through 
flattery. 

Of the effect of this popularity on 
her character her sister testifies that she 
was not made proud by it, but was still 
the same loving, self-sacrificing, devoted 
Louisa as of old. Thus her good sense 
and warm heart kept her soul pure and 
made her worthy of the love and esteem 
which she received in life and which 
makes her memory dear. 



30 



Mr. Alcott 

Amos Bronson Alcott was born in 
Wolcott, Connecticut, November 29, 
1799. From his mother he inherited a 
gentle, refined nature. She wished him 
to have a college education and to study 
for the ministry, but the circumstances 
of the family did not permit this. From 
the age of six to ten he attended the 
common school nine months of the year, 
and the next four years during the winter 
only. This was supplemented by read- 
ing all the books he could borrow from 
the families for miles around. Among 
these books were, "Hervey's Medita- 
tions," Young's "Night Thoughts/' 
Burgh's "Dignity of Human Nature," 
and Bunyan's "Pilgrim's Progress." The 
latter he borrowed and read every year 
while at home. Books were his great 

Note.— All quoted passages are excerpts from "Memoir 
of Bronson Alcott." 

31 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

delight; he spent his evenings in reading, 
and took his book to the field to read 
while uie oxen rested. At the age of 
twelve he began keeping a diary, using 
ink which he made himself. In the 
spring when he was fifteen, being dissatis- 
fied with farm life, he found employment 
at a clock factory; but as he was not 
pleased there, he went home and for 
three months studied with the minister 
of the parish. 

After this, with his cousin, William 
Alcott, he made two trips on foot, 
peddling small wares, through Western 
Massachusetts. Then he canvassed in 
New York for a book. A year later he 
and his cousin were confirmed in the 
Episcopal church and he was encouraged 
in studying for the ministry. The near- 
est he came to being a clergyman was 
that, when meetings were held in the 
schoolhouse by the Episcopalians, he and 
his cousin took turns in reading prayers 
and sermons. 

32 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

In later years, when he gave up the 
idea of the ministry on account of the 
expense, he drifted away from the rites 
and forms of the church, never connected 
himself with any religious body, and was 
not in the habit of attending church 
service. For some years he was classed 
with the Unitarians, but as his ideas 
became more and more advanced, the 
Unitarians were shy of adopting his 
theories, lest they be led into, they knew 
not what. 

When he was nineteen years old a 
desire to see something of the world and 
also to help in the expense of the family, 
of which there were six children younger 
than himself (a brother was born two 
years later), led him to start for Virginia, 
hoping to obtain a common school to 
teach near Norfolk. He found a school, 
but could get no boarding-place, so he 
bought some almanacs and small articles 
of tinware and started peddling. When 
he returned home in the spring he had 
33 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

eighty dollars for his father, after buying 
himself new clothes. Pleased with this 
success, he continued peddling in com- 
pany with his brother or cousin, for 
several seasons, changing his goods to 
fancy articles, and now and then he made 
a futile attempt for a school. 

The culture of the people he met during 
this time was agreeable to his taste. He 
said: "I can make peddling in Virginia 
as respectable as any other business. I 
take much pleasure in travelling, and in 
conversation with the Virginians,— ob- 
serving their different habits, manners, 
customs, etc., and I am conscious that 
it is of great advantage to me in many 
points of view." Being treated with 
politeness by the people of good breeding, 
he often stopped to read or talk with per- 
fect leisure, and so he acquired a polish 
of manner unknown in his native town. 
This became so a part of himself that 
years after, an Englishman, in speaking 
of him, said, " Why, your friend has the 
34 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

most distinguished manners, — the man- 
ners of a very great peer." This was 
the greatest compliment an Englishman 
could pay. But with the refined manners 
of the gentry he also took on the easy- 
going, extravagant habits of the young 
Southerner, and on returning home from 
his second trip by the way of New York 
he thus writes in his diary : " I purchased 
a costly suit of clothes, the best in Broad- 
way, and wear the same to the surprise 
of my townspeople and the chagrin of 
my father and cousin William. Now 
begin to write my name 'Alcott' instead 
of 'Alcox/ as my father wrote his, the 
old spelling being Allcock." 

That summer he spent in frivolous 
pursuits, displaying his fine clothes and 
paying attention to the maidens of the 
neighborhood. The next winter he wrote 
from Virginia: "The costly coat scorns 
peddling and sinks money fast. Peddling 
will never do, — neither profit nor pleasure 
therein." Of this season of frivolity he 
35 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

was afterward deeply ashamed, and from 
this experience, perhaps, came that strong 
dislike for show and vanity which he had 
himself in after years, and with which 
he endeavored to imbue his children. At 
one time when he moved into a house 
where the former occupant had left a 
mirror, he sent word to him to "take 
away that thing of vanity." 

At the end of that winter he borrowed 
eight dollars and a half from his brother 
and started for home, walking much of 
the way. He entered New York in his 
stocking feet, for his shoes had become 
unmanageable, and he had thrown them 
into the dock at Amboy, New Jersey, 
when he took the boat for New York. 
In the dusk of the evening he made his 
way to a shoe dealer and bought a new 
pair of shoes, and the tailor mended his 
coat while he slept. He had only a six- 
pence in his pocket when he reached 
home, but the experience was helpful. 
He abandoned his spendthrift habits, and 
36 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

hoping to retrieve the past, persuaded 
his father to help him with an outfit 
again. This time he applied himself to 
business, but was taken sick and incurred 
debt instead of making money. While 
he was sick among the Quakers of Caro- 
lina, the religious instruction he received 
from them and their example had an 
important influence on his opinions and 
conduct in after years, and awakened a 
desire for purity and real worth and a 
delight in exercises of thought and de- 
votion. The result of the five years' 
peddling was to bring upon his father a 
debt amounting to about the same that 
would have taken him through college. 
The experience and education, while very 
different, may have been in the end quite 
as helpful. 

When fully recovered from his sick- 
ness, Mr. Alcott turned to school-teaching 
in Connecticut, first in Bristol, for a short 
time, then in Cheshire. There he intro- 
duced methods never known before in 
37 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

New England. To gain the confidence 
and affection of the children was his first 
aim; then he thought compulsory meas- 
ures would not be needed; to obey 
would be a pleasure rather than a dis- 
tasteful duty. Constant, uniform kind- 
ness he claimed was more successful than 
corporal punishment. Correction was 
aimed at the mind rather than the body, 
as it was the mind that committed the 
error and should receive the correction. 
The spirit of the kindergarten was mani- 
fest in his system, though the name was 
not then known. 

At first the earnest and superior manner 
of the young teacher gave him popularity, 
and he soon changed the whole atmos- 
phere of both school and room. For one 
thing he began a course of gymnastics, 
probably the first used in a common 
school in the state. He believed that 
once the youth were rightly instructed 
mentally, morally and physically, they 
would become the reformers of humanity 
38 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

at home. In fact the redeeming of man- 
kind through the youth of the country 
was the idea he started out with. These 
new methods were variously commented 
upon. The Boston Recorder of May 14, 
1827, quotes from a writer in Connecti- 
cut: " There is one school of a superior 
or improved kind, viz.; Mr. A. B. Al- 
cott's school in Cheshire, — the best 
common school in this State, perhaps in 
the United States." But a spirit of 
criticism and complaint was also astir; 
some of the tales from the children were 
listened to and talked about by the 
parents, instead of their seeking to know 
the truth of the matter for themselves. 
This resulted in the formation of another 
school with a lady teacher, and Mr. 
Alcott concluded to retire, after having 
spent one hundred and twenty-five dol- 
lars in changes he desired during the 
eighteen months he was there. He then 
went back to Bristol and worked with 
the same result as at Cheshire. 
39 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

About this time Dr. William Alcott of 
Wolcott wrote to Rev. Samuel J. May 
of Brooklyn, Connecticut, who had in- 
terested himself in common schools, 
describing the Cheshire school and its 
teacher's theory. Mr. May urged this 
same teacher to visit him, which he did, 
remaining a week. Mr. May says : " I have 
never but in one instance been so imme- 
diately taken possession of by any man I 
have ever met in life. He seemed to be 
like a born sage and saint. He was a 
radical in all matters of reform; went to 
the root of all theories, especially the 
subject of education, mental and moral 
culture." The result of this visit and of 
his continued acquaintance with the 
family of Mays, for it was there he met 
his future wife, was his going to Boston 
and opening an infant school, in June, 
1828, which he left the next fall for one 
of older children. This one commenced 
with six boys, others coming in after- 
ward, and of them he says: "They are 
40 



The Alcotts as I Knew them 

the class of children I have desired; ex- 
cellent material for the study of Nature in 
her simplicity and innocence. I wish to 
philosophize upon the pure workman- 
ship of the Creator, to aid in preserving 
its symmetry and beauty." 

In February he admitted girls, and 
soon removed to a more convenient room, 
and the success of the school was quite 
encouraging. The next January, 1830, 
the following entry was made in his 
diary: "Heard from my companion in 
Brooklyn. Our marriage in the spring 
seems to me, on the whole, warranted by 
existing circumstances. Were none but 
myself involved in the consequences, I 
should not hesitate a moment. But the 
happiness of another may be involved by 
the decision. But are not the ills of life, 
as well as its happinesses, alleviated by 
united sympathy and affection, and can 
separation avert their presence? Have 
I not rather listened to a deceitful delu- 
sion, when I imagined I was obeying the 
41 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

dictates of reason? Why should we be 
longer separated in anticipation of dis- 
tant and dubious evils, when the miseries 
of absence are the most certain, the most 
increasing, we can feel? Providence be- 
stows his bounties equally upon all, and 
it will be our folly alone if we do not 
obtain our share. In hope, when founded 
upon virtue, there is safety ; and in virtue 
combined with love there is both safety 
and happiness, though external ills assail 
and worldly circumstances oppose." 

Their marriage took place the next 
May, and the next December they went 
to Philadelphia by invitation of some 
Quakers who wished Mr. Alcott to open 
a school there. The plans did not mature 
rapidly, and not till Februray did they 
decide upon Germantown, a few miles 
from the city, as the place to locate. 
Hiring a house, the Rooker Cottage, they 
went to the last dollar in furnishing it 
for housekeeping and thought of board- 
ing some of the pupils if necessary. 
42 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

March 16th, 1831, a little girl all their own 
was given them, whom they named Anna 
Bronson, this being Mr. Alcott's mother's 
maiden name. He immediately began 
her education, and also began to keep a 
record of her physical and intellectual 
progress, in so minute a manner that in 
five months it covered one hundred 
pages. Of this record he says, "I have 
attempted to discover, so far as this 
could be done by external indication, 
the successive steps of her physical, 
mental, and moral advancement." Mrs. 
Alcott in speaking of this record says, 
" It seems as if she were conscious of his 
observations, and were desirous of fur- 
nishing him daily with an item for his 
record." 

The school opened in May with five 
pupils; the next month they numbered 
ten. His main purpose was to form the 
character, both mental and moral, of the 
pupils. He says: "They arrive at the 
school at eight o'clock in the morning, 
43 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

have an hour's play in the yard, and 
enjoy a pleasant social intercourse until 
nine o'clock, when their exercises in the 
schoolroom commence. The relation of 
a story by the teacher, involving an illus- 
tration of some virtue, and designed to 
excite virtuous feelings in their bosoms, 
usually begins their exercises. Both 
teacher and children remark upon the 
story, and illustrate the principles in- 
volved in it, by events or feelings drawn 
from their own reading or experience. 
This exercise usually occupies an hour, 
when the children commence writing on 
their slates, or in books, simple exercises 
in spelling, reading, definition, expression, 
drawing, etc. All are competent to write 
in Roman letters. In a variety of exer- 
cises on their slates and in their books 
they pass the day, — three hours in the 
morning and two hours in the afternoon. 
Nothing is presented to them without 
first making it interesting to them, and 
thus securing their voluntary attention. 
44 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

They are made happy by taking an inter- 
est in their own progress and pursuits." 

Their second daughter, Louisa May, 
was born November 29, 1832, adding one 
more pupil for her father to observe and 
to educate. 

Mr. Alcott began to feel that this field 
was not the best place to develop the 
scheme for education which had been 
slowly evolving in his mind since he 
began to teach, and he inclined toward 
Boston as a more fitting place for his 
purposes; but he first tried a school in 
Philadelphia for one term, with the same 
lack of success. During his stay in these 
two places he had enjoyed the best of 
society; had read extensively the writings 
of Aristotle, Plato, Bacon, Sir James 
Mackintosh, Brougham, Carlyle, Cogan, 
Bulwer's novels, Shelley's poetry, and 
various works on education, morals and 
religion, but nothing so absorbed him as 
studying human nature in his infant 
daughters. With others he made an 
45 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

attempt to enlist public thought in ad- 
vanced ideas of education by lectures 
and by publishing a journal, but the latter 
expired at the age of three months. 

Returning to Boston, he opened a 
school in September, 1834, with thirty 
pupils between three (his own daughter) 
and twelve years of age, in Masonic 
Temple, which was at that time one of 
the finest buildings in the city. He 
spared no pains or expense in fitting up 
the rooms with paintings, busts and 
books, in order that a picture of ideal 
beauty and perfection should address 
itself to the serenity of spirit he con- 
sidered the native attribute of unspoiled 
childhood. Thus settled, he indulged 
in a daydream of a comfortable living 
and paying up the debts which had 
naturally accumulated, and he felt that 
the sensation of thrift was a delight. 

He said: "I shall first remove ob- 
structions to the growth of the mind; 
these lie in the appetites, passions, de- 
46 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

sires, and will. Intellectual results will 
follow the discipline of Che sentiments; 
for in these lie the guiding energies of the 
whole being. He who reaches the will 
and subdues the desires brings the child 
under his control, and has commenced 
the work of human culture on a basis 
that will sustain and continue. The 
heart is the seat of action,— material, 
organic, intellectual, moral— influence 
this, and the whole being feels the touch. 
To 'keep this with all diligence ' is the 
purpose of education, 'for out of it are 
the issues of life.' " 

Teaching in this high mood, Mr. Alcott 
found favor with those who were of like 
faith. Mrs. Alcott's genial spirit and the 
interest of her brother, S. J. May, added 
to the influence, and the school went on 
for the year "from grace to glory." But 
the difficulties of keeping up to the high 
mark became evident. 

Mr. Alcott did not find much help from 
books in his work. He said: "I have 
47 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

been thrown mostly upon my own re- 
sources, and have created, from circum- 
stances and the ideal of my own mind, 
the material for intellectual and spiritual 
nurture." 

Miss Elizabeth Peabody assisted him 
and kept a record of the school from her 
standpoint, which was published in 1835, 
and of which it was said, that it was 
full of interesting Socratic and Platonic 
matter. Mr. Alcott said of it: "Its ac- 
ceptance is problematical. It embodies 
some of my mind and practice, and pre- 
sents a glimpse of my purpose." William 
Russell of Philadelphia said of it: "We 
make use of it at home as a sort of 
juvenile family Bible. I am truly glad 
that such a work has come out. I do 
not know how much good it may do, 
but it is the most eloquent testimony 
that I have heard." "The Annals of 
Education" spoke thus of it: "We must 
say that while we rejoice to see a ' Record 
of a School ' from any quarter, while we 
48 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

wish to see many, and hope to see some 
called forth to meet the errors of this 
one, — we regard it as a mingled mass of 
truth and error, of useful and useless and 
injudicious principles and methods. It 
will be interesting to every thinking 
teacher, but dangerous to the unthinking. 
We esteem the author highly, and hope 
reflection and experience will lead him 
to correct his views." 

Mr. Alcott expressed his satisfaction 
in the progress of the school thus: "At 
my school the spiritual fire begins to 
warm some of the drowsy, cold natures 
into life and movement; but I have yet 
much to do. I have succeeded in inter- 
esting all, have reached the understand- 
ings of all, and I am feeling my way to 
their hearts. I am vivifying the imagi- 
nation; the affections will come along 
with this. * * * Here are young beings 
who have lived ten or twelve years, and 
have not yet learned the first conditions 
of spiritual progress, — whose views of 
49 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

obedience and application are adverse 
to improvement." 

Miss Peabody in describing the school 
says that about twenty children came 
the first day, all under ten years of age, 
except two or three girls. They occupied 
chairs, sitting in an arc around Mr. Alcott, 
who began by asking each one his idea of 
coming to school, and received varied 
answers, one saying "to learn," another 
" to behave well," etc., but all agreed that 
they came to learn, to feel, think and act 
rightly. Then school discipline was con- 
sidered, with the conclusion that they 
would prefer that Mr. Alcott should cor- 
rect them rather than leave them in their 
faults. During the talk many anecdotes 
were related as illustration, and three 
hours were thus spent with reading. Mr. 
Alcott was very strict, though mild, re- 
quiring the closest attention of each one 
to what he was trying to teach. One of 
his methods of punishment was to take 
part of the correction himself, thus prov- 
50 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

ing that the innocent must suffer with the 
guilty. The Bible was read constantly 
in school, Mr. Alcott giving his own 
peculiar views of the subjects. 

A boy ten years old wrote thus in 1836 : 
"This morning we began by singing Old 
Hundred, Mrs. Alcott playing on the 
piano, and leading us with her voice, 
which I think is a very fine one. We 
sang for about a quarter of an hour, and 
then Mr. Alcott explained to us the words 
we had just been singing, which I think 
were very interesting and characteristic. 
The reading was very interesting. It 
was about the visitation of God to Moses, 
from a thunder cloud, on the top of Mt. 
Sinai, and when he delivered to him the 
Commandments, which now appear to 
me much closer and much more strict 
than before. Mr. Alcott asked all those 
who had never disobeyed one of the Com- 
mandments in their whole life to hold up 
their hands, — not one held up their 
hands." 

51 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

With the opening of the school, which 
drew crowds of visitors to its beautiful 
room, and through the recommendation 
of Dr. Channing, whom he had met in 
Philadelphia, and of other influential 
people, Mr. Alcott became for a while a 
"Boston favorite" with all that that im- 
plies. Besides his weekday conversa- 
tions on Christ and the Gospels, he occa- 
sionally held Sunday readings in his 
schoolroom, and from the interest at first 
shown his ambition pictured "the germ 
of a church that should bring not only 
the young but parents and others to hear 
the simple words of the Gospel, and find 
something in them suited to their spiritual 
growth and joy." He says: "I am to 
teach, — and I am to teach that which is 
of universal import — the common nature 
that we inherit. * * * A church, when 
it shall come, will give me full scope." 

Mr. R. W. Emerson once, after a talk 
with Mr. Alcott, wrote in his journal: 
"Friend Alcott declares that a teacher 
52 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

is one who can assist the child in obeying 
his own mind, and who can remove all 
unfavorable circumstances. He believes 
that from a circle of twenty well-selected 
children he could draw in their conversa- 
tion everything that is in Plato, and much 
better in form than it is in Plato." 

In 1837 Mr. Alcott published the first 
volume of " Conversations with Children 
on the Gospels/' which Miss Peabody had 
reported. In the preface of the book she 
said they "were recorded, because it was 
thought that they might prove a model 
for parents and teachers who were de- 
sirous of giving a spiritual culture to the 
young; and also, because Mr. Alcott felt 
that what the children should freely say 
would prove to be a new order of Chris- 
tian Evidences, by showing the affinity 
of their natures with that of Jesus." Mr. 
Alcott said of it, " It is the Record of an 
attempt to unfold the Idea of Spirit from 
the Consciousness of Childhood; and to 
trace its Intellectual and Corporal Rela- 
53 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

tions, its Temptations and Discipline, its 
Struggles, and Conquests, while in the 
Flesh. To this end the character of 
Jesus has been presented to the consider- 
ation of children, as the brightest Symbol 
of Spirit, and they have been encouraged 
to express their views regarding it." 

The book and author alike were severe- 
ly criticized by the newspapers. A few 
passages concerning birth were found 
especially objectionable, although one 
cultured lady said of them: "I could not 
have imagined that those conversations 
about Birth would not be received with 
reverence and thanks, by all who might 
have the privilege of either reading or 
hearing them. I felt my own mind ele- 
vated by them." The Daily Advertiser 
complained that " on the most important 
and difficult questions this teacher, while 
he endeavors to extract from his pupils 
every thought which may come upper- 
most in their minds, takes care studiously 
to conceal his own opinions." " In some 
54 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

cases he gives opinions, and sometimes 
opinions of very questionable soundness." 
He supposes "that a new era in philos- 
ophy is dawning upon us in the discovery 
that childhood is a type of the divinity." 
The Courier, a paper which afterward 
stood bravely by the unpopular cause, 
compared Mr. Alcott with Kneeland, who 
had been indicted for blasphemy, and 
suggested that he also be brought before 
the honorable judge of the municipal 
court. Mr. Emerson came to his defense 
and wrote to the Courier a censure for 
what it published. He said, "In that 
work [Conversations on the Gospels] a 
passage or two occurs which, separated 
from the connection in the book, might 
give great uneasiness to many readers. 
Precisely these passages one of the daily 
papers selected, and dragging them out 
of the protection of the philosophy and 
religion which hedged them round, held 
them up to censure in its columns. These 
unlucky scriptures, innocent enough to 
55 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

the reader of the whole book, were copied 
with horror into another paper and kin- 
dled the anger of your correspondent. 
* * * In behalf of this book, I have but 
one plea to make, — this, namely, let it be 
read." 

The excitement about the book ran 
high; at one time a mob threatened to 
assault him at one of his evening con- 
versations, but this plan was not carried 
out, and quiet soon followed. The sale 
of the book, which at first had been rapid, 
ceased ; but the next month he published 
the second volume. Some years after- 
ward an attorney in Boston sold the re- 
maining copies by the pound for waste 
paper. 

The school, which had gradually de- 
creased from year to year, now numbered 
only ten. The next year he received a 
colored girl into the school, and the 
parents of his other pupils, except one, 
refused to have their children attend if 
she remained. Mr. Alcott would not 
56 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

turn her away, and the school came to an 
end after five years of existence, there 
being only his three daughters and one 
paying pupil besides the colored girl. 
Thus his idea of laying the foundation of 
a broad and generous spiritual education 
for the American people failed, affected 
by the outcry of the people that he was 
corrupting the youth of the modern 
Athens by his conversations. 

During these years Mr. Alcott had in- 
curred debt, and with all these trials his 
health was impaired. Now, after con- 
sidering various plans, he hired a cottage 
with an acre of land in Concord, Massa- 
chusetts, where he hoped to support hi 
family by tilling the land and working 
for the farmers around him, thus uniting 
labor with culture, as he " held conversa- 
tions as well as the plow." The following 
July, 1840, their fourth daughter, Abby 
May, was born. 

For a time he worked bravely, but his 
heart was ever turning toward his mission 
57 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

in the world — " to inspire thought. " His 
longings were toward England, where he 
had made some friends through his books. 
Through the kindness and liberality of 
his friend Emerson he went to England 
in May, 1842, leaving his wife and children 
in the care of a brother during his absence 
of six months. In writing to his brother 
he said: "Come then, — if your wishes 
and affairs second my request. I find 
little for my hands to do here; every 
avenue to honest employment seems 
closed to me; no one wants me, since I 
am not a profitable hireling, and rather a 
questionable person to employ. I have 
passed days in the woods wielding the 
axe, but it amounts to little, while my 
thoughts and interests are far away, and 
the strokes fall heavy; the best of it is 
the echo resounding from the blows." 

Arrived in London, he met with a warm 
reception from his friends, and was soon 
settled at an institution managed accord- 
ing to his own ideas and named for him, 
58 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

"Alcott House." But he failed to find 
encouragement for his labors there. A 
few enthusiastic persons were willing to 
join him in a social reform in New Eng- 
land, and three men accompanied him 
home in October for that purpose, and 
were added to his family for the winter, 
thus increasing Mrs. Alcott's care and 
work. 

The next spring they started their ideal 
community life in Still River, Harvard, 
purchasing a farm remote from dwellings, 
and away from any road, and naming the 
place "Fruitlands," from the imaginary 
fruit which was to be raised there under 
their cultivation. 

In "The Dial," a magazine of that 
time, they thus announced their plan: 
"Ordinary secular farming is not our 
objects. Fruit, grain, pulse, herbs, flax 
and other vegetable products, receiving 
assiduous attention, will afford ample 
manual occupation, and chaste supplies 
for the bodily needs. It is intended to 
59 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

adorn the pastures with orchards, and to 
supersede ultimately the labor of the 
plough and cattle, by the spade and 
pruning knife. Consecrated to human 
freedom, the land awaits the sober cul- 
ture of devout men. * * * The inner 
nature of every member of the Family 
is at no time neglected. A constant 
leaning on the living spirit within the 
soul should consecrate every talent to 
holy uses, cherishing the widest charities. 
The choice library is accessible to all who 
are desirous of perusing these records of 
piety and wisdom. Our plan contem- 
plates all such discipline, cultures, and 
habits as evidently conduce to the purify- 
ing of the inmates." 

As they were to have no intercourse 
with worldly persons, the cares and in- 
jurious effects of a life of gain would be 
avoided. The following account of their 
life has been given: "No animal sub- 
stance — neither flesh, fish, butter, cheese, 
eggs nor milk — was allowed to be used at 
60 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

Fruitlands. They were all denounced as 
pollution, and as tending to corrupt the 
body and through that the soul. Tea 
and coffee, molasses and rice, were also 
proscribed, — the last two as foreign lux- 
uries, — and only water was used as a 
beverage. Mr. Alcott would not allow 
the land to be manured, which he re- 
garded as a base and corrupting and un- 
just mode of forcing nature. He made 
also a distinction between vegetables 
which aspired or grew into the air, as 
wheat, apples, and other fruits, and the 
base products which grew downwards 
into the earth, such as potatoes, beets, 
radishes and the like. These latter he 
would not allow to be used. The bread 
of the community he himself made of 
unbolted flour, and sought to render it 
palatable by forming loaves into the 
shape of animals and other pleasant 
images. He was very strict, indeed 
rather despotic, in his rule of the com- 
munity, and some of the members have 
61 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

told me that they were nearly starved to 
death there; nay, absolutely would have 
perished with hunger if they had not 
furtively gone among the surrounding 
farmers and begged for food." 

The planting was late, the only crop 
raised was barley and that was injured 
in harvesting, and yet Mrs. Alcott was 
expected to prepare three meals a day 
for the family, which sometimes num- 
bered twelve, besides doing the ordinary 
house work. No wonder she could tell 
the tragic side of Fruitlands! A cold 
winter brought Mr. Alcott to realize the 
necessity of common clothing, for linen 
garments were not warm enough, cotton 
clothes had been given up because cotton 
was produced by slave labor, and wool 
must not be used, as it was robbing the 
sheep of their right. The question, how 
were they to be shod when the shoes they 
then were wearing were gone, presented 
itself, " for depriving the cow of her skin 
was a crime not to be tolerated." Even 
62 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

the canker-worms on the apple trees were 
not to be destroyed, as they had a right 
to the apples, as well as man. 

After a visit to the community Emer- 
son wrote, "Alcott and Lane are always 
feeling of their shoulders to find if their 
wings are sprouting." 

Six months of community life led to 
its breaking up. By midwinter all had 
left but Mr. Alcott and his family, and 
dire poverty stared them in the face. 
"Then," said Mr. Alcott in telling about 
it years after with a pathos in his voice, 
"we put our four little women on an ox 
sled and made our way to a neighbor's." 
Broken-hearted, he retired to his chamber, 
refused food, and was on the point of 
dying from grief and abstinence, when 
his wife, the noble heroine that she was, 
prevailed on him to continue longer in 
this ungrateful world. 

The next spring found the family 
settled in East Quarter, Concord; and 
now for the first time they had a home 
63 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

of their own, bought with money left to 
the girls by Mrs. Alcott's father, helped 
out by a gift from Ralph Waldo Emerson, 
the never-failing friend of the family. 
High hopes and ideal dreams had in a 
few months vanished like a fleeting soap- 
bubble, leaving only a sad remembrance 
and perhaps some practical experience. 

In this dilemma Mr. Alcott applied for 
a primary school to teach, but was re- 
fused. He says in his diary: "Are there, 
then, no avenues open to the sympathies 
of my townspeople? God! wilt thou 
permit me to be useful to my fellowmen? 
Suffer me to use my gifts for my neigh- 
bors' children, if not for themselves, and 
thus bless the coming, if not the present 
generation. How long, O Lord! how 
long wilt thou try me, by the exclusion 
from the active duties of Church and 
State, and more than these, from the 
discharge of my duties to my neighbors 
and to my neighbors' children? To what 
ostracism does the frank declaration of 
64 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

his opinion sometimes drive a candid and 
thoughtful man! Yet far better this 
than to tamper with principles and their 
God. Even the little primary school was 
denied me,— but my own children are 
still within reach of my influences; for 
which and bread for their mouths, and 
raiment and shelter for their bodies, 
thou hast put it into the heart of some 
to spare me from begging these neces- 
saries. Blessed be poverty, if it make 
me rich in gratitude and thankfulness 
and a temper that rails at none! But 
forgive me for intimating so much in 
spoken words." 

Failing to obtain the school, Mr. Alcott 
turned his attention to improving his 
place, and to reading and meditation in 
preparation for giving conversations. 
Terraces were formed on the hill back 
of the house, walks laid out, trees planted, 
a rustic arbor built and a bath house 
constructed from the most gnarled and 
crooked sticks that could be found in the 
65 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

woods, and finished with a thatched roof. 
With Henry D. Thoreau he built for 
Mr. Emerson a summer house in rustic 
style dedicated to the nine Muses. Of 
this Thoreau said : " As for the building, 
I feel a little oppressed when I come 
near it." (He passed it on the way from 
his hermit cabin in Walden woods to the 
post office.) "It has no great disposi- 
tion to be beautiful; it is certainly a 
wonderful structure, on the whole, and 
the fame of the architect will endure as 
long as it shall stand." 

Mr. Sanborn said: "It stood a pic- 
turesque temple, and then a beautiful 
ruin, for some fifteen years." The 
thatched roof seemed not to have been 
adapted to the rigors of New England 
winters, for two years later, we find this 
entry in Mr. Alcott's diary: "This morn- 
ing repair a little thatching and interior 
of Emerson's summer-house, standing 
gracefully on the lawn, and embowered 
now by evergreens set out by Thoreau 
66 




The boys cheered the flag and the maker. 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

and myself. The front gable is seen 
from the road, and attracts the notice 
of passers-by, as it did in that autumn 
while we were building it, — they wonder- 
ing and prattling about what it could 
be for." 

The ferment, as Louisa herself would 
have called it, occasioned in Kast Quarter 
by the Alcotts moving there soon sub- 
sided, as in all yeast of good rising quali- 
ties it should. With his neighbors Mr. 
Alcott had not much to do, although he 
was genial and pleasant when circum- 
stances brought them together, being too 
much of a gentleman to be otherwise. 
To one of them, a man of sterling worth 
and good sense and a good reader withal, 
he said one day: " There are three grades 
in man's life, the animal, the intellectual, 
and the spiritual. I have been where 
you are, and in time you may be where 
I am." The remark meant no offence 
and gave none, the neighbor retaining 
his own opinion on the subject. The 
67 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

children shared in his geniality, as he 
enjoyed their innocent sports. During 
the Civil War a simple-minded woman of 
the neighborhood, with more patriotism 
than good judgment, made a flag and 
put hearts on it in place of stars, " because 
they looked just as well and were easier 
to make/' she said. Then the "Home 
Guards," a company composed of the 
young boys of the neighborhood (D. S. 
Mason, E. W. and J. C. Bull, E. H. 
Go wing and Henry Wheeler), escorted 
Mr. Alcott to her house, the flag was 
raised, and he made a speech. The boys 
cheered the flag and the maker, and then 
three times three were given for Mr. 
Alcott, and the young patriots felt they 
were good citizens of "Uncle Sam." 

Mr. Alcott was tall and slender, of 
impressive presence. With his gray hair 
falling over his coat collar he reminded 
one of a Patriarch. A clear, pleasing, 
blue eye lighted up his features, in which 
a consciousness of merit was quietly, 
68 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

though none the less firmly, expressed. 

For companions he had Emerson, living 
between his own house and the village; 
Thoreau, in his cabin at Walden pond, 
as it was then called, now the renowned 
Lake Walden; Hawthorne at the Old 
Manse, and Ellery Channing in his home 
in the village. George William Curtis 
spent a while with the Concord farmers 
Barrett and Hosmer in 1844-5; and as 
visitors at times came Margaret Fuller 
and James Freeman Clarke. With such 
a company of thinkers Alcott was well 
satisfied. He could live in complete 
serenity with his own high thoughts, 
and continue — as he had once written to 
his mother in answer to the query, what 
was he doing? — ' tf Still at my old trade, 
hoping, which has thus far given food, 
shelter, raiment, and a few warm friends, 
who cherish me and mine in this time 
of need." 

After three years of this precarious life 
they sold the place to Nathaniel Haw- 
69 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

thorne and moved to Boston, where Mrs. 
Alcott was employed as city missionary 
and, with the daughters, was the main 
support of the family. Mr. Alcott gave 
conversations when he found a circle to 
listen to him. This was his only means 
of earning money, yet he knew not how 
to make a correct price for them. So 
unskilled was he in money matters that 
one season he put the price of the single 
tickets so low that it was cheaper to buy 
them singly than by the course, and he 
gave generously to those who wished to 
hear, seeking for listeners, rather than 
such as were agreeable to the company. 

It is related that at one time, when by 
a series of questions he was likely to be 
" driven to the wall/' instead of giving 
a simple answer, he began talking most 
delightfully, soaring higher and higher, 
as if he had "taken the wings of the 
morning, and" says the reporter, "he 
brought us all the glories of heaven. I 
believe none of us could tell what he 
70 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

said, but we listened with rapture." 
Perhaps this was the occasion when he 
forgot to get something for dinner, which 
his wife had sent for by him, and his 
excuse was, "he had been up in the 
clouds." Of these conversations a Bos- 
tonian said, "It was like going to heaven 
in a swing." 

After a while he formed a club number- 
ing more than a hundred. James Russell 
Lowell, who was one of the members, 
said of it: "The Club is a singular ag- 
glomeration. All the persons whom folks 
think crazy and who return the compli- 
ment, belong to it. It is as if all the 
eccentric particles which had refused 
to revolve in the regular routine of the 
world's orbit had come together to make 
a planet of their own." This Club soon 
died a natural death for want of money. 
Had Mr. Alcott been a millionaire, many 
of his visionary schemes would have de- 
veloped with an appearance at least of 
success, greatly to his joy and pride. 
71 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

Conversations proved no more successful 
in a financial view than teaching had 
been, and a change must be made. 

Two years were spent in Walpole, 
New Hampshire (1855-57), where Mrs. 
Alcott had family friends who gave them 
the use of a house, and then Concord 
became their home for the third time. 
With money left the girls by a relative, 
an estate was purchased next the one 
they formerly owned. The buildings 
were considered nearly worthless, but 
gave Mr. Alcott a chance to exercise his 
love for remodelling, and in time, after 
many changes, a pleasant, tasteful home 
was the result, with the comforts of real 
home life. A grand old elm stood in the 
front yard, and apple trees surrounded 
the house, which gave it the name of 
" Orchard House.' ' Soon after his return 
to Concord, he was appointed superin- 
tendent of the public schools, the first 
person to hold that office in the town; 
in fact, he was quite instrumental in 
72 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

creating the office. He made trips in 
the West, lecturing and holding conver- 
sations, during the winter months, by 
which at first he only met his own ex- 
penses, but after Louisa's popularity 
came, he was able to take money to his 
family. 

The success of Louisa's " Little 
Women/' published in 1868, gave her 
father courage to publish his " Tablets," 
which was mostly made up of essays that 
had been printed in the Boston Common- 
wealth. That was followed by " Concord 
Days" and a reprint of the "Record of 
Mr. Alcott's School." 

In the summer of 1879, the school of 
Philosophy was opened, holding its first 
session with thirty pupils in Mr. Alcott's 
study. This was the realization of a 
long-dreamed ideal, and the crowning 
glory of his life. As far back as 1840, 
Mr. Emerson wrote to Margaret Fuller 
thus: "Alcott and I projected the other 
day a whole University out of our 
73 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

straws." Their plan was that a few kin- 
dred spirits should in some country town, 
"hold a semester for the instruction of 
young men." Each would choose his 
own subject and give lectures or conver- 
sations thereon each week. "We may 
on certain evenings combine our total 
force for conversations; and on Sunday 
we may meet for worship, and make the 
Sabbath beautiful to ourselves. The 
terms shall be left to the settlement of 
the scholar himself. He shall under- 
stand that the teacher will accept a fee, 
and he shall proportionate it to the sense 
of benefit received and his means." 

This impracticable idea of fees was 
not carried out when the school became 
a reality, but the price for attendance 
was fixed. People from all classes from 
far and near were drawn to the school, if 
only for one session. Many came for 
instruction, and many to see the old his- 
toric town and take in the school as a 
side issue; others came to criticise, and 
74 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

many hoping to see the noted Louisa. 

Mr. Alcott thoroughly enjoyed the 
renown which he received as Dean, and 
also the attention given to his gifted 
daughter. Writing to a friend he said: 
" Yes, the school is a delight, and a real- 
ized dream of happy hours in days of 
sunshine. Life has been a surprise to 
me during the latter years, and I allow 
myself to anticipate yet happier sur- 
prises in the future still to be mine." 

That many of the lectures were in- 
structive to an intelligent audience no 
one would deny; that some dealt with 
the unknowable and unthinkable was 
also true. Visitors were fond of reporting 
according to the impression made on 
their own individual selves. 

For four years Mr. Alcott participated 
in the school sessions and lived in the 
zenith of his glory. During the fall of 
1882 he engaged in writing two sonnets 
on Immortality, but was stricken with 
apoplexy, October 24, from which he 
75 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

never fully recovered. His speech was 
never again clear; but after a time he 
was able to drive out, see his friends and 
now and then make a call, and he visited 
the school a few times. 

He made his home with his eldest 
daughter, Mrs. Pratt, going with her 
family from town to city according to 
the season. The writer, calling one day 
during the last years of his life, found 
him seated by a window in his comfort- 
able chair; beside and within easy reach 
was a revolving book-case. She asked 
what books he read most, and he pointed 
to those from his own pen, of which 
there were eight or ten, and looking up, 
smiled. He gradually declined and 
passed away, March 4, 1888, at Louis- 
burg Square, Boston. 

Through life, Mr. Alcott abstained 
from meat and confined himself to simple 
diet, though the rest of the family gradu- 
ally adopted the use of common but not 
rich food. One morning during the latter 
76 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

part of his life a guest at breakfast with 
them remarked, "So you do not eat 
meat?" He replied, "No, it is a relic 
of the savage"; then said the guest, "I 
must be much of a savage for I depend 
on meat." His courtesy would not allow 
that, and he said, "not necessarily so, 
but it belongs to the savage." 

To one looking over Mr. Alcott's ex- 
perience the fact becomes apparent that 
many of his peculiar ideas and of the 
methods which he endeavored to intro- 
duce in his schools and which caused his 
failure then, have since come into general 
use. With all his fanatical and imprac- 
ticable theories, which often induced 
ridicule even among his friends, he was 
pure in heart and character, strong in 
friendship, and generous to a fault, and 
his biographer, F. B. Sanborn, says, 
"When he died he left fewer enemies 
than any man of equal age can have 
provoked or encountered in so long a 



career." 



77 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

Though Mr. Alcott was always fine in 
conversation, he did not write well until 
he had passed threescore years and had 
overcome his great self-consciousness. 
Mr. Emerson said of him, " When he sits 
down to write all his genius leaves him; 
he gives you the shell and throws away 
the kernel of his thought." Lowell gives 
a similar idea in his Fable for Critics. 

At different times Emerson expressed 
himself in regard to Mr. Alcott thus, "A 
wise man, simply superior to display, 
and drops the best things as quietly as 
the least." Again after three days spent 
with him: "I could see plainly that I 
conversed with the most extraordinary 
man and the highest genius of the time. 
* * * Wonderful is his vision. * * * 
Last night in the conversation, Alcott 
appeared to great advantage, and I saw 
again, as often before, his singular su- 
periority. As pure intellect I have never 
seen his equal. * * * Alcott is a ray of 
the oldest light. They say the light of 
78 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

some stars that parted from the orb at 
the deluge of Noah has only now reached 
our earth." 



79 



Mrs. Alcott 

Mrs. Alcott, whose maiden name was 
Abigail May, was born in Boston, October 
8, 1800, the youngest of twelve children. 
Her father was Colonel Joseph May, her 
mother, Dorothy Sewell; thus she in- 
herited from the best of New England 
blood. She says of herself: " My school- 
ing was much interrupted by ill health, 
but I danced well and at the dancing 
school remember having for partners 
some boys who afterward became eminent 
divines. I did not love study but books 
were attractive." When nineteen, she 
studied with a private teacher, French, 
Latin and botany, read history exten- 
sively and made notes of such books as 
Hume, Gibbon and Hallam's Middle Ages. 

She first met Mr. Alcott at her 
brother's, Rev. Samuel J. May, when 

Note. — All quoted passages are excerpts from "Memoir 
of Bronson Alcott." 

80 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

he went to confer with Mr. May in regard 
to schools and education, and though 
going a stranger, extended his visit 
through a week. How much the sister's 
presence had to do with the prolonged 
stay may not be told, but evidently it 
was a case of love at first sight on the 
part of both. She said: "His views of 
education were very attractive. I was 
charmed by his modesty, his earnest 
desire to promote better advantages for 
the young.' ' 

In after years she used to say he looked 
to her as she had always fancied Jesus 
did, and for some time she did not under- 
stand whether her feeling toward him 
was love v worship, but after a year's 
absence nytnt with a brother in the 
West, by which her father hoped she 
might outgrow her interest in Mr. Alcott, 
she decided it was true love. In a letter 
to him, after reading some pages of his 
diary, she thus expresses herself: "Your 
journal has been most interesting and 
81 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

valuable to me. You have revealed the 
man I have wished to know, and the 
being I thought alone I could love. 
* * * When I speak of Love, I do not 
mean that flippant little god to whom 
votaries of fashion address their prayers, 
whose wings they sometimes borrow and 
flutter through the bowers of ideal roses 
and lilies; nor those more careless pur- 
suers of pleasure who i kneel at every 
shrine and lay their heart on none/ 
No, — I mean that clear though deep 
current of affection which, stealing un- 
observed into all the recesses of the heart, 
issues thence only in the pure healthy 
rills of kindness, tenderness, good will, 
devotion. This is what I feel for the 
only being whom I ever loved as com- 
panionable, or with whom I could asso- 
ciate in the heavenly tie of matrimony." 
It was this true love, kindled at first 
sight and deepened and strengthened 
through all their married life of nearly 
fifty years, united with her naturally 
82 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

cheerful, hopeful disposition, and her 
firm faith, which never wavered, in Mr. 
Alcott's real worth and in a better time 
coming when people would come to 
understand and appreciate him, which 
enabled her to bear without complaint 
his successive failures and the consequent 
straitened condition of the family. 
Their marriage was solemnized May 23, 
1830, in King's Chapel, Boston, where 
her father was warden for many years. 
The ceremony was performed by her 
brother, Rev. Samuel J. May. From 
this time on, through many years, hope- 
ful anticipation and sad disappointment 
alternated in the lives of the couple thus 
united. Only two months after their 
marriage she wrote her brother: "My 
husband is the perfect personification of 
modesty and moderation. I am not sure 
that we shall not blush into obscurity 
and contemplate into starvation. " Little 
did she then dream how near the truth 
was this expression. 
83 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

Mrs. Alcott was a person of energy 
and executive ability united with real 
common sense, of which her daughters 
said in mature years they " would rather 
have one particle of mother's common 
sense than all father's philosophy/' and 
she could not fail to be often sorely tried 
with the easy-going, impracticable ways 
of her husband. Yet, with her naturally 
quick and impulsive temperament, she 
so schooled herself that impatience was 
seldom exhibited. Of her patient en- 
durance with his absent-minded habits 
one who boarded in the family during 
their last living in Boston gives this 
instance, the only time he knew of her 
speaking impatiently to Mr. Alcott. One 
morning when he went out she commis- 
sioned him to procure a certain article 
needed for dinner; on his return at noon 
she asked for it; he replied, "he had for- 
gotten all about it, he had been up in the 
clouds." In her disappointment she said 
hastily, "I wish you had stayed there," 
84 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

and the next instant she would regret 
the remark. 

The December following their mar- 
riage their wandering life began with 
their going to Philadelphia for a few 
months, then to Germantown, where 
Mr. Alcott opened a school. She thus 
writes to her brother in the spring : " This 
is the anniversary of my wedding day, 
and I devote an hour to you in living 
over the past and projecting the future. 
It has been an eventful year, — a year of 
trial, of happiness, of improvement. I 
can wish no better fate to any sister of 
the sex than has attended me since my 
entrance into the conjugal state. Our 
prospects are good. I wish you could 
see our delightful situation. You would 
not wonder that we went to our last 
dollar to establish ourselves in this little 
paradise. Imagination never pictured 
out to me a residence so perfectly to my 
mind. I wish my friends could see how 
delightfully I am settled. My father has 
85 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

never married a daughter or seen a son 
more completely happy than I am. I 
have cares, and soon they will be arduous 
ones; but with the mild, constant and 
affectionate sympathy and aid of my 
husband, with the increasing health and 
loveliness of my quiet and bright little 
Anna, with the co-operation and efficient 
care of my nurse and housekeeper, a 
house whose neatness and order would 
cope with Federal Court, a garden lined 
with raspberries, currants, gooseberry 
bushes, a large ground with a beautiful 
serpentine walk shaded with pines, firs, 
cedars, apple, pear, peach and plum 
trees, a long cedar hedge from the back 
to the front fence, with good health, clear 
head, grateful heart and ready hand, — 
what can I not do when surrounded by 
influences like these? What can I leave 
undone with so many aids?" 

The society here she found attractive 
and congenial to her taste, and she later 
writes to her brother: "Our prospects 
86 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

are pleasant and encouraging; we have 
found many very important friends, and, 
though in Germantown, we shall not be 
cut off from their generous and intelligent 
society. We enjoy the simple habits and 
manners of the people here very much. 
You would be delighted with the cheerful 
and natural behavior of the most wealthy 
and aristocratic part of society. The 
Friends are the majority, and this, I 
suppose, gives a dignified, tranquil and 
simple air to the whole. " 

But this scene of domestic happiness 
did not long continue. The school was 
not a success, and in the autumn of 1834 
they returned to Boston with their two 
little girls, Anna and Louisa, and teach- 
ing was again tried with the old lack of 
success. When the clouds were darken- 
ing their horizon, this heroic woman thus 
writes: "You have seen how roughly 
they have handled my husband. He has 
been a quiet sufferer, but not the less a 
sufferer because quiet. He stands to it, 
87 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

through all, that this is not an ungrate- 
ful, cruel world. I rail; he reasons, and 
consoles me as if I were the injured one. 
I do not know a more exemplary hero 
under trials than this same i visionary/ 
He has more philosophy than half the 
persons who are afraid he is thinking too 
much. His school is very small, or will 
be at the commencement of another 
quarter. He will begin with about ten 
or a dozen here for the summer term. 
I sometimes think extreme poverty 
awaits us. With the idea comes before 
my mind a thousand enterprises and 
expedients. But oh, my girls! what ex- 
posure may they be subjected to! But I 
do not woo doubt, but I wed sorrow, and 
I surely do not need that alliance to 
promote either my faith or hope. * * * 
I am no angel, though I expect to be one 
of these days. I never aspired to any kind 
of a pinion but a goose-quill, and I shall 
be very apt to flop that about when there 
is anybody who cares to see my flight." 
88 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

When trials and persecutions ran high 
she thus writes: "It is a low state of 
moral discrimination which will give the 
man an honorable discharge who has 
been twenty years gambling in fancy 
stocks, but drives into the regions of 
starvation an exalted spirit, whose de- 
sires and efforts for the twenty best 
years of his life have been to elevate and 
improve the moral and intellectual con- 
dition of mankind. I try not to believe 
it; but the cruel sacrifices we are daily 
called upon to make compel me to des- 
pair of better things yet awhile. Can 
Mr. Alcott have time to work out his 
problem, we may yet hide our faces and 
strike our breasts for shame at our in- 
credulity. I say ours for I have been 
among the sceptics, and he still thinks 
me almost impotent in faith. But his 
patient endurance often staggers me, and 
the undaunted manner with which he 
assumes his burden and cares, giving up, 
with cheerful submission, those things 
89 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

which I know are dear to his heart and 
lovely to his eye, for the rigors of toil 
and privation — fill me with admiration. 
There is no sighing nor complaining, but 
silent bowing to the dispensation of in- 
justice and ignorance, — where he had 
reasonably expected intelligent co-opera- 
tion, or loving patience. Let us, my 
dear brother, sustain him. This is my 
resolution. Depend upon it, a reality 
is here, which does not show itself all on 
the surface. There is a depth from 
which pure and living water wells up at 
times, to refresh thirsty souls, — supplied 
from the source of all life." 

Probably the experience at Fruitlands 
was the hardest strain on Mrs. Alcott, 
both physically and mentally, and must 
have been a great test of her faith in her 
husband. With four children, the oldest 
twelve years, and others, making a family 
sometimes numbering more than a 
dozen, the care and work falling mostly 
upon her, the necessity of preparing three 
90 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

meals a day principally from barley, 
and the effort to change the method of 
cooking that one article, so as to form an 
appetizing dish, must have told on her 
strength. She once said that during the 
stay there the only opportunity given her 
for a rest was, when suffering with a sick 
headache, brought on from overwork, 
she was obliged to keep her bed for a day. 
Yet when the experiment came to its 
sad end, she was the one to encourage 
her husband to try again. 

The years of the Alcotts' first living 
in the East Quarter were a season of great 
trial to Mrs. Alcott, as in fact was all her 
married life, till Louisa's writing brought 
in money for the family. They owned 
their house, but it would not feed or 
clothe six persons. With his failure at 
Fruitlands Mr. Alcott had given up some 
of his peculiar views of diet and dress, 
but he was not a success at tilling the 
ground. Perhaps his recent experience 
and disappointment may have tended 
91 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

to a morbid idea of farming, for he said 
to a neighbor one day, " Working in the 
earth soils one's soul." The girls were 
too young at that time to teach. Their 
manner of living was inexpensive. Mrs. 
Alcott with her deft fingers fitted over 
clothing given by friends for the girls, 
and by her cheerful, brave spirit made 
the home pleasant; no one seeing her 
for a short time would have imagined 
the wolf was threatening at the door. 
At one time a simple-minded girl was 
boarded there to help out the income. 
When the family went to Boston to live 
in 1848, Mrs. Alcott was at first employed 
there as city missionary, then sometimes 
had boarders, and at one time kept an 
intelligence office. Mr. Alcott gave con- 
versations. The quiet gentle Elizabeth 
(Beth of " Little Women") became the 
housekeeper, while Anna and Louisa 
taught, sewed, became companions to 
friends or invalids, wrote and did what- 
ever came to hand in their line of talent, 
92 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

Anna always doing her part to help along. 
At one time Louisa filled the place of 
second girl in a family. As it was honest 
labor, she was glad to do it till something 
more congenial offered. During this life 
in Boston Mr. Alcott began his lecturing 
trips in the West. The return from the 
first one, with almost an empty pocket- 
book, is most pathetically described in 
Louisa's "life, Letters and Journal/' 
and the noble, self-denying spirit of Mrs. 
Alcott was exhibited when, though sorely 
disappointed, she tenderly commended 
his effort and hoped for better results in 
the future. It was not till Louisa became 
noted through "Little Women" that her 
father's lecture trips brought much 
money; then at one time he returned 
with two hundred dollars. As the result 
of one of his later trips he handed his 
wife a hundred-dollar bill; she repressed 
her pleasure and satisfaction; then 
another was given her, and so on till five 
hundred dollars was laid in her hand. 
93 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

His last trip in 1880-81 realized him one 
thousand dollars, and he enjoyed the 
notoriety his daughter's fame gave him. 
A happy and thankful woman was 
Mrs. Alcott when for the second time 
they moved to the East Quarter, Concord, 
into a house all their own, and from this 
time she enjoyed all the comforts that 
love and a considerable sum of money 
could give, the latter increasing as the 
years went on. This was just after the 
death of Elizabeth, the quiet, gentle girl 
whose loving care and service made their 
home life so beautiful. While living in 
Walpole, just before their return to 
Concord, Mrs. Alcott went to a neigh- 
bor's where the children had the scarlet 
fever, to see that they had proper care. 
Through her Elizabeth took the fever 
and never fully recovered from its effect. 
A little affair of the heart about that 
time, which did not meet the approval 
of her parents, had the effect of causing 
a gradual decline, and she passed away 
94 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

from her earthly home at the age of 
twenty-three years. The mother's heart 
was sorely bereaved, but her hopeful 
spirit turned bravely toward those left, 
with thankfulness trusting for their 
future usefulness and worth. 

The Civil War came on, and while 
deprecating war, she thoroughly sympa- 
thized with and believed in the liberation 
of the slaves, and was ready to do all she 
could for them, even to letting Louisa go 
as nurse. I was calling there one day 
when a covering for a quilt was needed 
for the soldiers and she went into the 
attic and brought down a dress of the 
dear departed Lizzie's, saying: "The 
girls think Lizzie's clothes too sacred to 
be touched, but this had better be in 
use for the soldiers than lying in the 
attic. Come again if you need anything 
else." All through her life the deserving 
poor received help from her if possible. 

During the years after the close of the 
war it was a great pleasure to sit by her 
95 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

as she plied her ever busy needle, sitting 
in her low rocker beside a window of 
the sitting room with her basket of work 
on the deep-cushioned seat, and to listen 
to her recital of "what the girls were 
doing/' the one with her pen, the other 
with her brush. The natural motherly 
pride and satisfaction she enjoyed was 
a delight to witness and sympathize with, 
and has been a pleasant remembrance 
these many years. She told once how 
Louisa, by questioning, would get her to 
tell some of her experiences in the early 
days in Boston; then with her merry 
laugh she would add, "The next thing I 
would know, she had woven the whole 
into a story, such as you find in ' The Old 
Fashioned Girl' and others of her books." 
Once she explained her husband's re- 
ligious belief, and in what way he differed 
from Mr. Emerson. And again she told 
of one evening when company was there 
and some one proposed taking the lights 
out of the room and having each one tell 
96 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

a ghost story to see which could do the 
best; after several had related their tale, 
Louisa's turn came, but before she was 
done someone asked to have the lights 
brought back, as the scene was becoming 
too gruesome for the dark. 

Often have I recalled the story of the 
load of wood which Mrs. Alcott told us 
during a drive one day. One cold Satur- 
day morning in early winter, when they 
lived in the west part of the town, a boy 
from a poor neighbor came to borrow 
some wood ; their own supply was 1 early 
gone, but Mr. Alcott with true generosity 
if not justice to his own family, rot only 
gave him a good part of it, but wl ee led 
it to his home. Mrs. Alcott would gladly 
share their meagre supply with a needy 
i cighbor, but felt that their own childrn , 
the youngest of whom was a baby, should 
rot suffer, and importuned him to go to 
the village, three-quarters of a mile away, 
and order more, but his comfortable 
room with his books attracted him and 
97 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

he said they would trust to Providence 
that wood would come or the weather 
moderate. Wagon loads of wood did 
often pass the house on the way to the 
village. Leaving him to his comfort she 
went about her work, but with anxious 
thoughts and wondering what would turn 
up. As the hours passed the clouds 
threatened a snowstorm. Along in the 
afternoon, going into the west room to 
see that the windows were all secure, 
she spied a load of wood surely enough 
coming down the street, but concluded 
to say nothing to her husband, wishing 
to see how matters would turn out. In 
front of the house the driver stopped and 
called at the door to see if they would 
not take his load of wood; there was a 
storm coming on and he wanted to get 
home; if he could leave it they might 
pay when convenient. Then Mr. Alcott 
with his usual calmness, a trait he rather 
prided himself upon possessing, turned 
to his wife, saying, " Did I not tell you, 
98 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

my dear, that Providence would pro- 
vide?" 

Mrs. Alcott, with her large generous 
heart which took in all who needed help, 
or sympathy, her motherly ways and 
practical kindly advice full of useful 
wisdom, was greatly beloved and re- 
spected by all who had the pleasure of 
her friendship. Watching jealously for 
the good of her own daughters, her in- 
terest went out to others as well, and 
many a young person welcomed counsel 
from her lips. In her concern for the 
welfare of the rising generation, she 
endeavored, as opportunity offered, to 
stimulate in the young mind a love for 
all that was good and helpful in life. 
When the Teacher's Institute, the first 
held in the state, was in session in Con- 
cord, she sought an interview with the 
young ladies of that body during a noon 
intermission, and gave a practical talk 
on themes of interest to them. Had she 
lived in the present time, she probably 
99 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

would have lectured to mothers on home 
and ethical topics. She was an easy, 
interesting and instructive talker on all 
the subjects of the day, never stooping 
to frivolous talk or gossip. A physician 
who attended her in sickness said it was 
wonderful, the range of knowledge she 
possessed and the pleasure he had in 
listening to her. None came to my 
father's house who so engaged my interest 
in their conversation as did Mrs. Alcott. 
To listen to her suggestions, her graphic 
descriptions, her humorous recital of 
some ludicrous incident, her pathos in 
serious matters, was a treat to my youth- 
ful mind. Her hearty but refined laugh 
was like a cordial, and a call from her 
left all present in a cheerful, happy 
mood. 

Vivid in my mind is the picture of a 
bonnet Mrs. Alcott wore at one time, 
which had an unique history. A farmer 
bought it in Boston as a present for his 
wife, at an exorbitant price, and of a 
100 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

very beautiful milliner who was after- 
wards accused of poisoning her husband. 
The farmer's wife wore it a while, then 
gave it to a lady in Concord who used to 
wear it doing her chores round the yard. 
Mrs. Alcott seeing her one day with it 
on exclaimed: "What a pretty bonnet! 
how sensible! just what I would like!" 
(it was a fine Dunstable straw in what 
was known as the Quaker style) "so 
much more comfortable than the present 
fashion." The bonnet was accordingly 
passed over to her and worn on her 
errands to the village and round the 
neighborhood. It was easily put on, 
requiring no look in the mirror for its 
right adjustment, and was also very 
becoming. 

The Alcotts, while most zealously 
recommending vegetable diet, daily 
shower baths and outdoor exercise, with 
plain living and pure thinking, all of 
which they practised, did not make them- 
selves obnoxious with their individual 
101 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

theories. Of the cold water practice the 
writer had a personal experience, the 
recollection of which even to this day 
causes a shiver. As I was rather a 
weakly child, Mrs. Alcott thought the 
cold shower bath would be a benefit to 
me; so one morning I went there for a 
bath, which she administered herself, 
following it by a faithful rubbing; then 
I started for home with the injunction to 
"walk fast/' but alas! I reached home 
with shivering limbs and chattering teeth. 
Another time a cold sheet pack was 
administered ; blankets and comfortables 
were of no avail to bring the desired re- 
action; after waiting the usual time, I 
was dressed and sent to walk in the 
summer sunshine to regain a normal 
condition. Thus ended the heroic cold 
water treatment for me, and without it 
I have outlived their entire family. 

As age came on, the hardships of her 
earlier life began to tell on Mrs. Alcott's 
health, and in September, 1866, just 
102 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

after Louisa's return from her last trip 
to Europe, she was very sick, and she 
was never again the same strong, ener- 
getic woman as before. The next sum- 
mer the dropsy which accompanied her 
heart trouble affected the brain, and 
for a little while bewilderment followed. 
Through the last decade of her life, ill 
turns were frequent, but her patience 
failed not, and she enjoyed the continued 
success of "the girls" as she always 
called Louisa and May. Her little grand- 
sons were a delight to her. She was fre- 
quently able to drive out and she enjoyed 
the old scenes. In September, 1877, 
came the final illness. May was abroad, 
but Louisa nursed her, writing stories 
while the mother slept. In October a 
nurse was procured to assist Louisa. 
The previous summer Anna (Mrs. Pratt) 
had bought a house in the village which 
she and her boys were occupying; Mrs. 
Alcott was carried there November 14, 
her husband and Louisa going with her. 
103 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

Anna thus writes of her mother's last 
days: "About a week before her death, 
at her earnest request we brought her 
to my house, hoping the change might 
help her. But it was too late. As she 
was borne up stairs in her chair she said, 
'The ascension has begun/ and so it 
proved, for she slowly drifted upward 
until just at night, November 25, she 
fell asleep peacefully. So tranquil was 
the departure we hardly realized she had 
left us, and sat long about her, watching 
the happy face and rejoicing that she was 
at rest. All day she had been murmuring 
to herself of the joy at going, saying again 
and again, ' Oh, how beautiful it is to die, 
how happy I am.' How can we mourn 
when she was so glad? And yet so large 
a heart cannot cease to beat without 
leaving a sad void behind, and no words 
can express how we miss her." Quiet 
services were held at the house on the 
28th, and she was laid beside the beloved 
Lizzie in Sleepy Hollow Cemetery. 
104 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

Mr. Sanborn says of the Alcotts, in 
his memoir of Mr. Aleott: " Scarcely any 
family in America lias published more 
volumes, and no portion of our New 
England literature is more characteristic, 
or will furnish more material for the 
future critic, than these books. But the 
best writer in the Aleott family was she 
who never published a book, and perhaps 
never thought of writing one, — Mrs. 
Aleott, whose literary gift was greater 
than that of her famous daughter, or 
that of her more original husband." 

Mr. Aleott in his sonnets pays this 
tribute to his wife : 

"Dear heart! If aught to human love I've owed 
For noble furtherance of the good and fair; 
Climbed I, by bold emprise, the dizzying stair 
To excellence, and was by thee approved, 
In memory cherished and the more beloved; 
If fortune smiled, and late-won liberty, — 
'Twas thy kind favor all, thy generous legacy. 
Nor didst thou spare thy large munificence 
Me here to pleasure amply and maintain, 
But conjured from suspicion and mischance, 
105 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

Exile, misapprehension, cold disdain, 
For my loved cloud-rapt dream, supremacy; 
To bright reality transformed romance, 
Crowning with smiles the hard-earned victory." 



106 



Anna 

Perhaps no babe was ever so closely 
watched, with her every motion, look, 
growth of body and development of 
mind more minutely and carefully re- 
corded by a father, as was Anna Bronson, 
the eldest child of Mr. and Mrs. Alcott, 
born in Germantown, Pennsylvania, 
March 16, 1831. Yet she grew up quite 
a child of nature, inheriting from each 
parent their best qualities; from the 
father a gentle and hopeful spirit, with 
her mother's large-heartedness, affection, 
cheerfulness and enduring love. With 
her a real friendship once formed was 
never broken or slighted, unless the 
object proved unworthy; then she relent- 
lessly tore it from her heart. 

With her friends she was open-hearted 
and affectionate, her greeting to them 
was such as to leave no doubt in their 
107 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

mind of her sincerity and devotion. 
From her modest and retiring manner, 
no one meeting her casually would ever 
imagine the amount of sentiment and 
romance in her nature. Of lively imagi- 
nation and quick perception of the lu- 
dicrous, she found much even in the 
details of everyday life to amuse, and 
had a happy faculty of picturing it to 
others. This was a strong trait in the 
whole family, and gave them much 
simple diversion among themselves at 
their own fireside. It was as good as a 
play to hear from each the several recita- 
tions of their experience of the day, as 
they gathered round the table at night, 
each vying with the other to add her part 
to the family entertainment. 

Anna was a natural actor and delighted 
in tableaux and simple plays, never out- 
growing the pleasure thus afforded. In- 
deed at one time she hoped to make 
acting her profession, and had she done 
so, no doubt another name of the family 
108 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

would have acquired fame, but partial 
deafness affecting her at that time, she 
was obliged to relinquish the idea, much 
to her regret and the delight of her 
parents, who did not favor the plan. 

A graceful and interesting writer, she 
sometimes indulged in composing short 
stories, and the incident told in " Little 
Women" of "Jo" writing a story and 
reading it to her mother and sisters as 
if it was in a newspaper, really belongs 
to the modest, unpretentious Anna. 
Their appreciation of the story was a 
great pleasure to her, yet she never 
aspired to writing a book in those days. 
After her mother's death she hoped 
sometime she might have the leisure 
to prepare a memorial befitting that 
noble woman, but the opportunity never 
came. 

Had she chosen authorship instead of 
marriage and motherhood, she would 
have made a success in that line. Ro- 
mance would have been her forte; sweet, 
109 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

noble characters would have developed 
under her pen, while every unworthy act 
would have received condign punish- 
ment. Her letters to her friends were 
delightful; one of her correspondents 
wrote on receiving a letter from her, "A 
real feast of kind-heartedness, love and 
sympathy." 

When quite young she began to teach, 
but never in a public school; usually a 
few pupils in the family of some friend. 
When they lived in Boston she and 
Louisa had a school of girls at one time 
in the house where they lived. After- 
ward, through her mother's brother, who 
was the pastor of a church in Syracuse, 
New York, she obtained a position in a 
state institution there, an asylum for 
feeble-minded children. She disliked it, 
but concluded to try to be contented be- 
cause it was duty. Thus here and there, 
teaching, sewing, or as companion, she 
did her part to the support of the family, 
sometimes enduring untoward treatment 
110 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

without complaint because money was 
needed. 

During a winter spent at home when 
Elizabeth (Beth) was not well and was 
confined to the house, the girls took part 
in acting plays with a few of the young 
people of the village; Elizabeth enjoyed 
seeing them dress, and their description 
of the fun; it served to brighten her 
shut-in hours. When the play required 
lovers it somehow came about that their 
parts were given to Anna and to John 
Pratt, the son of one of Concord's honored 
farmers, who came there from the " Brook 
Farm community. " The young man 
was just home from the West, which fact, 
with his manly appearance, made him 
attractive to a girl of a romantic turn of 
mind like Anna, and so quite naturally, 
from acting they became lovers in truth, 
and in early spring surprised their friends 
by announcing their engagement. 

After two years of sweet wooing they 
were married on the 23rd day of May, 
111 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

1860, the anniversary of the marriage 
of her father and mother; Mrs. Alcott's 
brother performing the ceremony as he 
had the parents' thirty years before. 
It was a quiet family wedding service 
which united these two young people for 
life; the concluding festivities, after 
some old custom, of a dance by the elder 
people circling the bridal pair under the 
old Revolutionary elm, which gracefully 
bent its branches over them within hand- 
reach from the lawn, formed a pretty and 
unique final to their romantic wooing. 

A pretty, simple cottage in Chelsea, 
surrounded by apple trees which had put 
on their bridal costume of delicate pink 
and white for the occasion was the home 
where John Pratt took his dear Anna. 
Here the young bride, who possessed her 
mother's domestic qualities, devoted her- 
self to making her home an attractive 
place for enjoyment for her adored hus- 
band. Two boys came to complete their 
happiness, but they were not twins as 
112 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

Louisa represented in " Little Women," 
there being two years between their 
births. As her deafness increased, Mrs. 
Pratt withdrew more and more from the 
outside world and found her greatest 
delight in doing for her family, not, how- 
ever, neglecting kind offices for others, 
when opportunity and calls came to her. 
As the talents of her sisters became 
developed, she was very proud of them, 
and justly so, and loved to tell incidents 
of their experiences, ever placing herself 
in the background. What was said of 
her grandmother May was equally true 
of her: "She was reserved in her deport- 
ment; she loved the doing of a good 
action better than the describing it. 
She never said great things, but did ten 
thousand generous ones. Her heart was 
all tenderness." Thus loving and loved, 
ten years of happy wedded life passed, 
and then the shadow of death came and 
the husband and father was taken from 
them. 

113 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

Now her life became bound up in her 
two boys, and for their sakes she moved 
to Concord, and with money from the 
life insurance of her husband, helped out 
by a sum from Louisa, bought a home in 
the village, known as the "Thoreau 
house." It had been the home of the 
mother and sisters of Henry D. Thoreau, 
and he had died there. In one of the 
rooms hung a painting of him, taken 
when he was a young man. When the 
last sister died, she requested that the 
picture remain in the house so long as 
it was occupied by people who were in- 
terested in her brother, and then be 
placed in the library of the town. Mr. 
F. B. Sanborn was the first occupant, 
and Mrs. Pratt followed him, and so the 
portrait was there for years, but it now 
hangs on the walls of the library. 

The winter after her mother's death, 

which occurred at her house, she wrote 

to a friend thus: "Father and Louisa 

are with me now ; our plans are unsettled 

114 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

for another year. I think it doubtful if 
they ever return to the old house (the 
Orchard House). It will never be home 
to us without the dear mother. She was 
for so many years the centre of all our 
hopes and plans; we hardly feel recon- 
ciled to the change, and life seems empty 
and sad enough. And yet we cannot 
wish her back, when she so longed to go. 
The end so beautiful, so happy, so peace- 
ful, all suffering past and only present 
the joyful thought of the speedy release, 
the longed-for reunion. I am now the 
house mother and full of cares, every- 
one coming to me for everything, but 
it is good to feel so necessary and I 
keep up good heart and feel glad my 
shoulders are so broad and strong for 
the burden." 

As her two boys, Fred and John, ar- 
rived at the age to have some occupation, 
they both entered the publishing house 
of Roberts Brothers, in Boston, the firm 
who had been not only Miss Alcott's 
115 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

publishers but her kindly advisers and 
warm friends. 

Mr. Alcott and Louisa continued the 
rest of their lives to make their home 
with Mrs. Pratt. The house was large 
and old-fashioned, with front door in 
the middle; but soon Anna writes: " We 
are always trying something new, for 
perhaps you will remember ' The Alcotts ' 
can never be quiet. So we have been 
improving a little and puttirg a wing to 
my already big house. In this we have 
a fine new study, with piazza and room 
above for Louisa. This gives us more 
convenience and father a room for his 
library. How I wish you would come 
here to live. What good times we would 
have together reading and walking, etc. 
When you come to Concord it must 
always be a part of your plan to make 
Annie's home one of your abiding places. 
I am almost as romantic as when we 
wrote sixteen love letters a day to each 
other. I find my old friends so much 
116 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

more satisfactory than my new ones I 
make nowadays that I seem to cling to 
them." 

The opening of the " School of Phil- 
osophy" in 1879 added much to her cares, 
because of the numerous visitors eager 
to see, not only the home of Louisa, but 
herself if possible. Her father asked 
one day why they did not go to the 
School? Al 1 a handed him a long list 
of names of four hundred callers and he 
said no more. Writing to a friend at 
one time, she said: "I have just returned 
from the seashore where I have been 
spending a month with my boys, and 
enjoying myself as only a very tired 
woman can enjoy perfect rest and free- 
dom from care. I went to Nonquit 
where Louisa has a cottage, a lovely 
green paradise which offers everything 
one can wish. Here I rested, and for 
fun got up theatricals (as usual), cha- 
rades, etc., and grew quite young and 
festive, and enjoyed my lark so much I 
117 " 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

did not want to come home when my 
summons arrived, but Louisa must have 
her turn, and as baby needed change 
they wished to spend August among the 
sea breezes. Thus we take turns and 
so keep our boys there eight or ten weeks. 
So I am alone in my glory in the old 
house, where father lives with me. As 
the 'School' is in session I can hardly 
call it quiet, for the study door stands 
open and all who wish come in. As I sit 
writing in my room no less than ten phi- 
losophers, men and women, have strolled 
in, and father is in his element. I keep 
out of the way and as 'Miss Alcott' is 
not at home and few of the wise ones are 
aware of my existence I keep out of a 
good deal of fuss. You see I do not ap- 
preciate my advantages and shun the 
ways of wisdom. I am like the confec- 
tioner who having all the sweets he wishes 
chooses plain bread and butter for supper. 
I have had so much of the so-called phi- 
losophy in my life that I care nothing 
118 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

for it, but content myself with what 
seems to me the true philosophy of every- 
day life. Louisa's motto, 'Do the duty 
that is nearest thee/ seems to me to em- 
brace as much philosophy as most of us 
need ; so few of us are able to do the duty 
uncomplainingly and bravely." 

Another time she wrote, "I am well, 
though at fifty-two one does not grow 
younger and I am getting to be a very 
stout gray old woman and find I don't 
spring up and down stairs as I once did. 
I still love novels and plays, and am about 
sixteen in heart, so I have something 
to comfort me in my old age. Concord 
is very jolly and I enjoy all the fun with 
my boys." Writing of Louisa's desire 
to go to Europe again she said: "You 
know in old times she was always longing 
for something, always in search of ad- 
venture, never contented with humdrum 
home life. It is the temperament of genius 
the world over, this aspiration for some- 
thing beyond their reach. Their dis- 
119 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

content and moody views of life seem 
inseparable from the gifted natures. So 
I sometimes thank heaven I am a hum- 
drum, and cannot be gloomy or down- 
hearted long. Though I have many sad 
hours, something within always bids me 
hope, and I have a happy faculty for 
seeing the silver lining to every cloud." 
The marriage of her eldest son, which 
occurred in due time, gave Mrs. Pratt 
great pleasure, and as one and then 
another grandchild came, her cup seemed 
full of happiness. And so her bright, 
hopeful disposition tided her over the 
seasons of trial and affliction, through 
her father's long sickness of paralysis, 
and when one by one every member of 
her family but her two boys were called 
away to the land beyond. To the last 
she was brave and cheerful, doing loving 
acts when she could, thinking of others 
rather than self. In July, 1893, a slight 
ill turn occurred, which did not alarm 
her friends, and suddenly she was not. 
120 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

The last member of A. B. Alcott's family 
had passed from earth, each leaving an 
individual record. In a Boston daily 
paper was the following obituary notice: 
"Mrs. Anna Bronson Alcott Pratt, 
widow of John Pratt and eldest daughter 
of A. Bronson Alcott, died at Concord, 
Massachusetts, Monday (July 17th). 
She was the original of 'Meg/ the sweet 
eldest one of the four 'Little Women ' 
who have been like sisters to all the young 
girls of America since they first appeared 
in literature. And many women who 
used to know 'Meg/ 'Jo' and 'Amy' 
almost as well as their own sisters and 
who rejoiced in 'MegV brave industry 
and endearing womanliness and happy 
home life will feel a pang as at the loss 
of a familiar flesh and blood friend of 
school-girl days, in learning that 'Meg' 
too has followed her sisters into the 
silent land." 



121 



May 

Abby May Alcott was the favored 
child of the family, arriving at young 
womanhood after Louisa had acquired 
money and could give her advantages in 
education and travel which money alone 
could procure. She was born in Con- 
cord, in 1840, just before her father's 
unfortunate Fruitlands' experience; and 
during her early childhood the family 
passed through the most severe season 
of adversity in their struggling life; but 
she was too young to realize the strait, 
and all took pains to shield the youngest 
from trial. 

Owing to the varied and trying de- 
mands on Mrs. Alcott, the care of the 
young child fell in a great measure to 
the loving, motherly Anna, and between 
the two a strong affection existed. Abby, 
for so she was called in her childhood, 
122 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

was of quick temper and exacting in 
disposition, but sunny withal, when not 
crossed. The Bcei e which Louisa de- 
scribes in "Little Women" of the break- 
ing of her shoestring when she was in a 
hurry one day was quite natural, and the 
picture is very vivid to the mind of one 
who knew her in early youth. But love 
was a strong element ii her nature, and 
quick return to sunshine always followed 
such an outburst. Her temperament 
being much like Louisa's, they often dis- 
agreed, and then Anna would prove the 
peacemaker. The bond of affection with 
all the family did not permit a variance 
of any length of time. 

As a child she could not be called 
pretty, though interesting. The mouth 
was not delicate, the nose decidedly like 
her father's and prominent; she had his 
eyes also, pleasant deep blue. But the 
years softened the nose, gave character 
to the mouth and with her clear com- 
plexion, loose flowing curls of delicate 
123 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

brown, clear, dancing, blue eye, winsome, 
artless manner, graceful motion, and 
artistic dress she was a very attractive 
young lady. One mother, at least, com- 
plained that her son's attention was taken 
too much from his college studies to play 
croquet with their pretty neighbor, May 
Alcott; for as a young lady she discarded 
the plain old-fashioned name of Abby, 
which was her mother's, for the more 
classic and modern one of May. 

Very early her books gave evidence 
of her love for drawing, and frequently 
among the sketches was to be found her 
ideal of a Grecian nose, which she sorely 
deplored not possessing herself. As her 
talent developed, all through the "Or- 
chard House" were traces of her brush, 
a panel here, birds or flowers elsewhere, 
to adorn the nooks and corners of the 
rooms, so that the old house which had 
been transformed from an old wreck, 
became the fitting home to please the 
cultivated taste. Over the mantle in 
124 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

her father's study she painted in Old 
English letters the epigram that Ellery 
Channing wrote for that place: 

The hills arc reared, the valleys scooped, in vain, 
If learning's altar vanish from the plain. 

With Louisa's first success, May was 
sent to the School of Design at the age 
of nineteen, and afterward had the best 
of instruction that Boston afforded. A 
friend gave her the opportunity of going 
to Europe, and Louisa and another young 
lady accompanied her. This was merely 
a pleasure trip, but three years later 
Louisa sent her there to study for a year, 
and the time was well improved by her, 
with different masters. Copies which 
she made from the paintings of Turner 
were highly prized. 

A young lady in the studio with her 
was ambitious to have a painting in the 
exhibition at Paris and was working for 
that purpose. May had not thought of 
such an honor for herself, but one day 
125 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

as they finished their simple lunch a 
sudden inspiration seized her to make a 
picture of the table and what was on it, 
plate, fruit, flagon and glass. When 
finished, she sent it to the Salon, where 
it was not only accepted but hung on the 
eye line, the place of special honor, much 
to her surprise as well as delight. The 
letter bearing the good news home was 
read in the sick room of the mother 
where the family were gathered. When 
the first flush of joyful excitement was 
passed, Anna exclaimed, "each one has 
acquired fame but poor I, who have 
done nothing. " Her father pointing to 
her two boys said, "Here is what you 
have done; it is more than all the rest." 
The painting attracted much attention 
and was noticed by the London Journal 
in flattering terms. In the joy of her 
own success May did not fail in sympathy 
for her friend whose picture was not 
accepted. 

Returning to Concord after her year 
126 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

of study, she endeavored to interest the 
young people there in the art she so 
dearly loved, and to this end opened her 
studio to them and directed their instruc- 
tion. French and Ehvell, who have 
since become distinguished, were among 
those who availed themselves of her 
generosity and interest. She shared the 
family talent in using the pen gracefully, 
but preferred the brush and easel to the 
goose-quill and inkstand. 

At that time California was an attrac- 
tive place for travellers, and Louisa gave 
her the money to go there, or to Europe 
again; she chose the latter, and in 
September, 1876, put the ocean between 
herself and her loved family for further 
prosecution of her life work in art. 

Her mother's health, which had been 
precarious for some time, failed, and she 
passed from earthly scenes in November 
of the following year. May felt the blow 
keenly, alone in a foreign land, and hav- 
ing with the grief a sense of self-accusa- 
127 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

tion that perhaps she ought to have 
returned home, though not summoned. 
For a week she shut herself in her room, 
not going to the table to meals. In the 
room opposite hers was a young Swiss 
gentleman of fine musical talent, who, 
feeling a sympathy for the beautiful 
young American in her sorrow, used to 
open his door and play sweet strains on 
his violin. When her retirement ended 
they became not only well acquainted 
but friends, then lovers, and as their 
artistic tastes were harmonious, were 
soon betrothed. In a short time Mr. 
Nieriker, the young man, was called 
away from London by business, and not 
wishing to be separated, they were 
privately married, March 22, 1878. 

Anna in a letter to a friend thus writes 
of them : " We are of course still absorbed 
in May and the new brother, and live in 
anticipation of our weekly letters which 
continue to bring such happy news. 
The newly married are now in their own 
128 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

home just out of Park, and full of de- 
light in everything, and each other, and 
leading a delicious life. All we hear con- 
firms our first pleasant impression of Mr. 
Nieriker, and his letters to us show him 
to be a gentleman of culture and refine- 
ment; also the possessor of a warm, 
loving heart and domestic qualities, 

which promise well for the future happi- 
ness of his wife. 

"May seems to have given him her 
whole heart, and to be quite willing to 
settle down into a housekeeper whose 
sole desire is to make home happy. She 
will, however, continue her art, as Ernest 
is very ambitious for her, and takes great 
pride in his gifted wife. Ernest Nieriker 
is a Swiss, son of a lawyer of good stand- 
ing in Baden, his grandfather being one 
of the eminent physicians of the Baths 
there. The family are very accom- 
plished, musical and fine linguists. 
Ernest is a banker. May is perfectly 
happy, and perfectly well, what more can 
129 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

we ask?" And later she writes: "Our 
i.ews of May is the happiest possible, 
she is full of delight with her home, hus- 
band, and the world in general." 

Her husband united with her in an 
invitation to "sister Louisa" to spend a 
year with them, but she thought it better 
for them to be by themselves for a while. 
Her health, also, was hardly equal to the 
trip just then, but she held it in pleasant 
anticipation for the near future, never 
to be realized. Prospect of motherhood 
was joyously anticipated by both families. 
Mr. Nieriker's mother and sister joined 
the young couple for the time. Mrs. 
Pratt (sister Anna) thus writes in Jan- 
uary, 1880, of the sad sequel to this 
happy term of life : 

" We have felt somewhat anxious about 
May ever since the birth of her child, 
November 8th. She has not seemed 
strong and her recovery was so slow, 
still she did gain, and was beginning to 
sit up and plan for the future. But it 
130 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

did not last. She was seized with an 
attack of brain fever and after a week of 
severe illness fell into a deep slumber 
from which she never fully awoke. 
Early in the morning of December 29th, 
she folded her hands upon her breast and 
passed peacefully away. The last days 
were happy, she lay dreaming, her hand 
moving as if it held the beloved pencil, 
and she murmured to herself, rousing 
once or twice to recognize her husband 
for a moment, or speak a few words. 

"It is hard to be reconciled to this 
great sorrow, May was so happy, so use- 
ful, so content to live, so blessed in all 
that makes life beautiful. Why should 
she not stay? In truth God's ways are 
full of mystery. We can only submit 
and wait. Somewhere in the future com- 
fort awaits us. Her husband is heart- 
broken and so desolate. Through all 
her illness he has been beside her day and 
night. No stranger has been allowed 
to touch her. Ernest, his mother and 
131 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

sister, have watched over her every 
moment, and been untiring in their de- 
votion. This is one comfort, and the 
dear little Louisa who is to be ours if she 
lives till spring. May gave her to Louisa, 
and the husband promised to fulfill the 
wish if she did not recover. At her own 
desire, expressed long ago in anticipa- 
tion of the possibility of the event, she 
was laid in a green churchyard just out- 
side of the city, where her husband can 
go with flowers and feel that she is still 
near him." On this side the ocean, in 
the family lot in Sleepy Hollow Cemetery 
in Concord, a little headstone bears the 
inscription, "M. A. Nieriker." 

In September the little Swiss " Louisa," 
May's legacy to her sister, came to 
America to be loved, petted and watched 
over by her aunts and grandfather, and 
she proved to the latter a source of great 
delight and comfort in his declining 
years. Mr. Nieriker's sister accompanied 
the nurse who was sent to bring her. 
132 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

No pains or expense was spared to make 
her young life one of joy. Anna writes: 
" Louisa is devoted to her, and the tie 
between them is very sweet. I hope we 
may keep her to fill May's place in our 
hearts; her father is still in Brazil trying 
to outlive his sorrow in work, and laying 
up money for the education of his little 
girl. We write regularly and love him 
very much for he is worthy of our esteem 
and affection. She is a beautiful child, 
full of life and talent like her mother, 
and an active brain which shows she is 
also a Nieriker." A year or two later 
she writes, " Our little Swiss maid is now 
a big bouncing bonny girl, making noise 
enough for a dozen boys and keeping the 
whole family in commotion. Louisa's 
life is devoted to this child and leaves 
her time for nothing else." 

As Louisa's health failed, the care of 

the child naturally fell to her aunt, Mrs. 

Pratt. When Louisa passed away, the 

little Lu Lu wrote thus to her father, 

133 



The Alcotts as I Knew Them 

"Dear papa, Grand-pa is dead, and now 
Aunt Louisa has gone and I am very 
lonely, you must come and take your 
little girl home." The father answered 
the pathetic summons of his little 
daughter, by coming to see her that 
summer, but not having a home of his 
own at that time, returned without her, 
to prepare for her coming at a later date. 
In June, 1889, Mrs. Pratt went with her 
to Zurich, Switzerland, where the father 
with his sister had made a home. 

Years after the little Louisa married 
an author named Razim and became 
a mother. They lived in Zurich. Her 
father never married again. 



134 



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